


cut from marble

by heliantheae



Series: salt lines and white lies [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Black Family Drama (Harry Potter), Demons, F/M, Family, Feminist Themes, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Hippogriffs, Humor, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Light Angst, M/M, Magical Realism, Wizarding Culture (Harry Potter)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-02-26 18:21:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 30,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21722941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heliantheae/pseuds/heliantheae
Summary: Narcissa's sixth year at Hogwarts. Features demons, drama, and maybe (definitely) murder.Slow updates. This will make a lot more sense if you've read the first two works, but you don't have to if you assume Lucius went to Durmstrang and is also a disaster.
Relationships: Andromeda Black Tonks/Ted Tonks, Lucius Malfoy/Narcissa Black Malfoy, Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Series: salt lines and white lies [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1364578
Comments: 134
Kudos: 131





	1. secrets don't like to be kept

**Author's Note:**

> me: i'm going to write more!  
> grad school, coming in like a wrecking ball: 
> 
> Work title from "Yellow Flicker Beat" by Lorde. Chapter title from "Good Grief" by Dessa. Updates likely to be glacially slow, but they'll happen.

Narcissa wakes up when something heavy lands on her chest. Years of sharing a home with Sirius—for whom she was an excellent pranking target due to her relative lack of interest in bloody retribution compared to the other members of the household—were compounded by a perhaps unhealthy and only partially genetically driven dose of paranoia. This meant she tended to react rather violently to surprises, and this instance was no exception. She flips herself out of bed with her wand in hand. Various wards and artifacts flare to life around her when they sense the alarm of their mistress. With a shield charm already thrown up and a curse ready on her lips, she has a moment to process what appears to be, at first glance, her empty bedroom.

There is a single, ominous croak.

Narcissa looks down, meeting the familiar, malevolent gaze of a toad-shaped demon. It’s illuminated by the weak morning light filtering in. She had Summoned it some weeks prior, but she had been careful to banish it back to whatever hellish rock it had been hiding under. That was after she bribed it into sharing three drops of its blood. Though minor in the grand scheme of things, it was still a servant of Bael. It wouldn’t have done to hold it against its will or set it free in the world. Now it sits at the foot of her bed, watching her. Very slowly, it blinks its golden eyes.

“What are you doing here?” Narcissa hisses. “Our deal is finished.”

She’s met with another blink. The demon opens its mouth, revealing an impressive set of teeth. Natural toads didn’t have teeth like that, she was sure, watching the scene unfolding with no small amount of alarm. Its mouth keeps opening, stretching, and contorting until finally, with a horrific gurrk noise, it coughs up her Hogwarts letter and several feathers.

“Did you eat the post owl? Merlin’s saggy—”

The language that follows could have curdled milk and certainly would have earned her a detention. The demon toad ignores her and makes its way to what had, moments before, been where Narcissa was sleeping. It hunkers down in the abandoned warm spot, closes its eyes, and appears to sleep.

Narcissa runs as many diagnostic charms on the letter as she can think of. It’s a considerable number given some of the less than savory activities she participates in. It’s not as many as it would have been if she had already had her customary two cups of tea that morning. It didn’t matter. Whatever bile existed in the demon’s stomach either wasn’t corrosive to witches or hadn’t had time to soak into the letter. She takes a moment to admire her self-control and caution. Her OWL results are contained within that letter and she’s been dying to know all summer. She rips the letter open.

_Dear Miss Black,_

_Please note that the new school year will begin on September 1st. The Hogwarts Express will leave from King’s Cross Station, platform nine and three-quarters, at eleven o’clock. I await your owl regarding which courses you wish to continue taking no later than August 15th._

_The sixth year book list is enclosed._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Professor H. Slughorn_

_Head of Slytherin House_

_P.S Congratulations on your Potions OWL, my dear! I hope to see you in class this year._

That bodes well. She had been more concerned about her Potions OWL than any of the others, save perhaps Transfiguration. One of the many drawbacks of being the youngest sibling was that all of her professors had taught her sisters. McGonagall had never quite recovered any good humor she might have possessed prior to meeting Bellatrix, even after the eldest Black sister graduated. Her treatment of Narcissa reflected that.

_OWL Results: Miss Narcissa Violetta Black_

_Astronomy: O_

_Care of Magical Creatures: E_

_Charms: E_

_Defense Against the Dark Arts: O_

_Ancient Runes: E_

_Herbology: E_

_History of Magic: A_

_Potions: E_

_Transfiguration: A_

Narcissa stares at the paper in her hands, stunned. She had passed History of Magic. Not even Andromeda had managed that. She’s about to skip down to the breakfast table to gloat when her eyes catch on the demon. It has one golden eye open, and it’s regarding her with interest. Waiting for her to turn her back, no doubt. She points her wand at it and whips a quick, “capio salis,” at it as it lunges toward her, stopping it mid-leap when it hits the salt line the spell causes to settle around it.

“I’ll deal with you later,” she tells it, which she means to be more threatening than informative.

Somehow, she doubts it’s impressed.

Narcissa dresses quickly, shrugging violet robes over a lavender gown. She casts her customary cosmetic charms, smooths away imaginary wrinkles in her robes, and flounces down to the breakfast table with one final glare at the demon. Her sisters aren’t there, and Narcissa can tell immediately that something is wrong.

Her mother looks like she’s been crying which isn’t that unusual, but her father is sitting very still, face white and hands clenched around his silverware. He looks rather like he’s considering stabbing something.

“Oh, you’re still here,” says Aunt Walburga, shooting a vicious glare at Narcissa’s father, “I thought you might have decided to run off with some dirty-blooded upstart. It seems to run in the family.”

Narcissa shoots a panicked look at Sirius, who makes a similar expression right back, shaking his head emphatically. Do not engage. Right. Her father looks from his butter knife to his sister-in-law and back again. He sighs audibly.

“Good morning, Aunt Walburga,” she says placidly. “You’re looking well this morning.”

Aunt Walburga examines her carefully, looking for any sign of attitude. Narcissa sits down and begins to spread jam on toast, trying very hard to appear innocent of all possible wrongdoing.

“You have demon saliva on your sleeve,” Aunt Walburga finally informs her. “I don’t know how you expect to keep a husband if you continue dressing so carelessly.”

As no verbal or magical curses follow that pronouncement, Narcissa decides she’s safe for the time being.

\--------

Making polite conversation through breakfast is agony, but after what feels like an eternity the meal is finished and Narcissa is able to bodily haul Sirius to her room. Regulus trails behind them, looking dejected.

“What happened?” she demands, “Where are Bellatrix and Andromeda?”

The boys ignore her, both staring with mild trepidation at the toad demon.

Narcissa follows their gazes, reassuring herself that the salt line is intact. It is.

“Don’t worry about it,” she says impatiently. “I’m handling it.”

The demon croaks and displays its teeth as if to refute her statement. She bares her teeth right back at it.

Sirius shakes himself like a dog and says, “Right. Okay. Technically this is my problem as the Heir but if you have things under control—”

“I do.”

“Right,” he repeats. “Anyway, Bellatrix and Andromeda both left the family’s protection last night.”

“They did what?” Narcissa asks faintly.

Aunt Walburga had hinted, but she hadn’t believed it. Not really. Even the demon has left off glaring at her to blink at Sirius. It was almost unheard of for someone to leave their family’s protection, especially in their social circle. For her sisters to have essentially disowned themselves, well. Narcissa has evidently missed something big.

Regulus hugs her and tells her armpit, “Bellatrix left to join _Voldemort_. How could she? She knows he’s a—he’s a terrorist! Or a cult leader! And Mother says he’s a halfblood too!”

That sounds like something Walburga would say. Narcissa strokes his Regulus’s hair and meets Sirius’s eyes. He shrugs minutely. Up to her how to handle this one.

“Where did you hear that?” she asks.

“The papers all say so. They say he sacrifices people, even kids my age, and wants to overthrow the Wizengamot.”

She hadn’t known Regulus had been paying attention to the news, let alone worrying about it. She starts thinking fast. He’s right about Voldemort—the man has mostly been limiting himself to public disturbances and property damage if the papers are to be believed, but if Regulus had overheard Uncle Orion and Father talking or read between the lines of articles covering the disappearances of minor bureaucrats and journalists—

“I don’t think Bellatrix wants to be involved in the political side of things, and I can’t imagine her ever hurting a child,” she tells him. She wouldn’t actually put it past her sister, but Regulus doesn’t need to know that. “I’ll bet this Voldemort is up to his eyeballs in rare Dark magic and she wants to know more about it. That’s probably why she left. You know how she gets.”

“I guess.” Regulus sniffs a little, but Bellatrix’s obsession with the Dark Arts is well-known to all of them. She’d dragged them all to France once just to go to a bookstore, which was quite the feat given none of them had been of age at the time. 

“That’s not all,” Sirius says. “Did you know Ted Tonks? He’s a Hufflepuff in Andromeda’s year.”

Narcissa‘s brain presents her with a picture of an affable-looking blond boy who had been several years ahead of her at Hogwarts. He’d been a Prefect, she was pretty sure. 

“I think I know him. Why? Wait, do you know where Bellatrix and Andromeda are? Are they safe?”

If anyone could really be safe around someone like Voldemort. She doesn’t say that part out loud, for Regulus’s sake and her own. She doesn’t want to think about it.  
“She and Andromeda might have told me so I could remove the family spells on them? I have the authority, being the Heir. They would have run either way and at least now my mother won’t be able to drag them back,” he hurries to add when he sees the look on her face.

Narcissa can’t fault that logic. She takes a moment to be grateful their ancestors were lazy and prone to passing off administrative duties to other family members. Her sisters are likely as safe as it’s possible to be.

“Fine. Now, what about Tonks? Why does he matter?”

“Andromeda eloped with him.”

“He’s a Muggle-born,” Narcissa says, the information not quite processing.

Sirius shrugs. “She’s about three months pregnant. I’m not supposed to know that, but I could tell when I was removing the spells.”

Regulus evidently hadn’t known any of this, because he moves from where he was huddled miserably under Narcissa’s arm to better gape at Sirius with her.

“What?” they ask in unison.

“No wonder Aunt Walburga is furious,” Narcissa breathes. “Voldemort is really a halfblood? And Andromeda really eloped? Dirty-blooded upstarts indeed.”

The Black family matriarch hadn’t necessarily approved of the rising potential Dark Lord’s actions, but she hadn’t actively opposed them either. Discovering that the man—a halfblood—had manipulated purebloods into following him would irk her to no end. Narcissa was surprised the older woman hadn’t had an aneurysm when she heard about Andromeda’s elopement. It was a sign of Uncle Orion’s continued decline in health that he hadn’t noticed her pregnancy. That wasn’t a good sign. He’d been holding Aunt Walburga in check, to some extent, for Narcissa’s entire life.

“You’re going to be an aunt!” Regulus exclaims, brain running down a very different track from Narcissa’s.

“Mother and Father don’t know about the baby, and we should keep it that way,” Sirius says, looking, pardon the pun, uncharacteristically serious. “Neither do your parents, Narcissa.”

She nods in affirmation. “Did either of them leave a way to get in touch?”

“Father disowned them already,” Sirius says. “Mother insisted, of course, but he wasn’t exactly reluctant. We’re not allowed to speak to them, technically. I’ll undo it as soon as Father dies, of course, but until then…”

Narcissa raises a tragically unimpressed eyebrow.

“They said they’d be in touch,” he sighs. “Probably when we return to Hogwarts, where mother can’t screen our mail.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Interested in following me on social media? You can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/PeonyPrice) or [Tumblr](https://peonyprice.tumblr.com/).


	2. bite my tongue, bide my time

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title from "you should see me in a crown" by billie eilish

Breakfast over with and having interrogated Sirius until she’s satisfied he’s not hiding anything else from her, the next order of business is school shopping. It’s really too bad her sisters couldn’t have waited a week to upend the family—nine OWLs is nothing to sneeze at and Narcissa would have liked to be fussed over.

She calmly submits to additional tracking and monitoring spells before she’s allowed to leave Grimmauld Place. Aunt Walburga didn’t quite believe she hadn’t known what her sisters had been planning and was acting accordingly. Sirius, grounded for his part in their escape and therefore stuck doing Hogwarts shopping with her rather than his friends, is also subjected to the indignity. He allows it, though with considerable ill grace. He’d only avoided a beating by dint of putting up too much of a fight to make it worthwhile. Regulus bounces impatiently by the Floo.

“Come on,” he says, not quite keeping the whine out of his voice. “I want to get my wand!”

A final spell settles over Narcissa’s skin like a net, and Aunt Walburga pronounces them free to go. Leaving the demon alone in her room makes her nervous, but she doesn’t have the supplies necessary to bind it to her. It’s a move she would rather have avoided entirely, but when something that’s been Summoned comes back of its own accord there are very few options left.

“Diagon Alley,” she says after Sirius and Regulus have gone through, and throws a pinch of Floo powder into the flames.

She steps out of the Leaky Cauldron’s fireplace to find Sirius surrounded by chattering boys and Regulus looking a little overwhelmed. Evidently Sirius had managed to contact his friends despite his mother’s best efforts. She’s grudgingly impressed, although she hasn’t quite forgiven him for not telling her what her sisters were up to. Narcissa wouldn’t have stopped either of them, but she would have liked to say goodbye.

“Potter,” she acknowledges the boys. “And company.”

Narcissa takes a moment to be glad she’s mostly done with puberty, although she wouldn’t have minded being several inches taller. It’s difficult to look down one’s nose at the rest of the world when they’re all taller than you. Lupin and Potter both look like they’ve been stretched on a rack and the latter is sporting an unfortunate wispy mustache. Pettigrew appears to be more pimple than person.

“Hello, Narcissa,” they chorus, looking significantly more subdued than they had been.

She rolls her eyes and tells Sirius, “Oh, go on. I won’t tell Aunt Walburga. I’d hate to drag you around while I do my personal shopping on top of school supplies. Meet back here at four o’clock?”

Potter fist pumps and Sirius mouths ‘thank you’ at her. They hurry away before she can change her mind. Regulus sighs, having already resigned himself to his fate.

“We’re not going dress shopping, are we?”

She ruffles his hair, prompting an indignant squeak. “Only if you misbehave.”

Narcissa leads him to the wall separating the Leaky Cauldron from Diagon Alley, taps it, and runs into an extremely frazzled Madam Flint almost immediately. Narcissa doesn’t remember the woman’s first name, only that she’s Mr. Flint’s third wife and the mother of his two youngest children. She looks near tears and is surrounded by more than a dozen children of varying ages.

“Oh, Miss Black,” Madam Flint exclaims. “I’m so glad to see you. I have the worst luck, you see, every year I draw the short straw and have to take the children school shopping and I couldn’t find a sitter for the girls because Madeline has been colicky,” here she lifts the baby she’s holding slightly as if to emphasize her point, “And with everyone being in different years there’s just so much to keep track of! Ollivander’s, the book list—did you know they have another new Defense teacher this year? And everyone needs different ingredients from the apothecary and the older boys want to look at Quidditch supplies and their mothers all want them to go somewhere different for robes, including to Nalia Zabini’s shop but Proserpine Parkinson says she’s seen my husband out with her twice now and I feel like everyone knew except for me and they’re all laughing at me and I don’t know what to do. I can’t just go to her shop and pretend she’s not having an affair with my husband, can I?”

Madam Flint is only a few years older than Narcissa herself and very kind, even if she is high strung. The wives of Mr. Flint’s friends and business partners have been taking advantage of that for several years now and rigging the ‘random’ choosing of who has to take their collective gaggle of children school shopping. Aunt Walburga cackles a little every time she thinks about it, saying it serves her right for being that naive. Narcissa personally thinks the woman knows the other wives are taking advantage of her, but lacks the backbone to do anything about it. The other women are twice her age and quite condescending about having their own husband and not someone else’s unwanted leftovers. Mr. Flint’s uncanny resemblance to a troll doesn’t help matters. Narcissa sighs when the baby starts to wail.

“How many of them are starting their first year, madam?” Narcissa asks. “I have Regulus for the day, so it won’t be any trouble to take them along with me.”

The relief on Madam Flint’s face is embarrassing. “There’s four—no. Five? Five of them starting their first year. If you could just make sure they have everything, I have their lists with the edits their mothers made somewhere here,” she hands the baby to Narcissa, who is too surprised to refuse, and starts going through her pockets, “You’re a lifesaver, Miss Black, I can’t think you enough—here they are!”

Narcissa returns the baby in exchange for the lists. They are, in fact, heavily edited. The list for whichever Selwyn is starting Hogwarts this year has had groceries added to it, and the list for the latest Fawley includes several orders the child’s mother wants to be placed for a Samhain celebration.

“I’m not doing all of this,” Narcissa says. “You aren’t an owl or servant and neither am I. Anyone that has an issue with that can take it up with me.”

Madam Flint cringes a little. “They’ll spread rumors or stop inviting me to things if I don’t. About both of us, probably.”

“My sisters were both disowned this morning,” Narcissa informs her, knowing it’s no use trying to keep that sort of thing a secret. “That’s going to be enough of a scandal that no one will care what anyone says about you.”

This renders Madam Flint momentarily speechless. One of the older girls, a step-daughter of hers, Narcissa thinks, says, “What the _fuck_?”  
Madam Flint doesn’t even scold her for her language. “Oh,” she says faintly, finally. “I suppose you’re right,” then after a moment and much more cheerfully, “Walburga must be having kittens!”

Narcissa is unable to prevent a snort. “You could say that.”

They go their separate ways, Madam Flint to Madam Malkin’s and Narcissa to Ollivander’s. She has acquired Jeremiah Flint, which has Regulus looking pleased, Barty Crouch Jr., which has Narcissa nervous about completing her demon-related errands given the boy’s father, Latona Selwyn, Delilah Fawley, and Agravain Travers.

“Alright,” she says. “Who wants to go get their wand?”

Things—things actually go pretty smoothly. More smoothly than Narcissa had been expecting, honestly. The children all listen to her, even when she takes one look at the instructions some of their mothers have sent and declares them to be ridiculous.

“Ah, Miss Black,” Ollivander says with some surprise when they enter his shop, “10 and ¾ inches, English oak and dragon heartstring. Very little give.”

“That’s me,” Narcissa confirms. “These six will be needing wands.”

Ollivander turns to study the six soon-to-be first years. “No Madam Flint this year?” he asks them.

None of them respond. Ollivander, with his bulbous silver eyes and whispery voice, can be a little intimidating. The dusty, cramped interior of his shop doesn’t help, particularly given the weight of magic in the air.

“She’s shopping with the older children today,” Narcissa replies.

“Hmm,” says Ollivander, like he thinks this is suspicious. “Alphabetical order then, if you please.”

The children hurry to comply. Regulus finds his wand on his first try, which is considered auspicious and will please Aunt Walburga. None of the other children prove to be tricky customers either, and soon Narcissa is handing over a startling amount of gold from the purse Madam Flint had given her. Wands are _expensive_.

Their next stop is the malletier’s to buy trunks. It makes the most sense. She can shrink and unshrink them as needed and they can pack their supplies as they buy them. Narcissa buys each of the rising first years a newer version of the one she has, with one compartment for school supplies and books, one for clothes, and one that’s made up of various shelves and storage containers for other assorted materials they might acquire. She eyes one that’s out of even her price range that professes to contain a full living space, complete with a kitchen and plumbing. Certainly an interesting idea for traveling, she muses, although the mechanics of plumbing in a trunk escape her.

She shrinks each trunk, nevermind that she’s underage since it’s not like the Ministry monitors Diagon, then gives them to their new owners. “Apothecary next,” Narcissa tells them. “It smells in there, and I’d like to get it over with.”

Having them pick out their own ingredients to fill a first year Potions kit will be a good experience for them, and will hopefully provide her with the opportunity to collect some of her own, more unusual ingredients from the shop’s basement. Unfortunately, they arrive at the same time as Professor Sprout. She’s escorting this year’s Muggle-borns and their parents.

“Oh, Miss Black,” Sprout says, beaming. “I’m so glad to see you,” to the parents she says, “This is Miss Black, a sixth-year Slytherin Prefect. An excellent student.”

“Hello, Professor,” Narcissa says, and to her own collection of first years, “This is Professor Sprout. She’s the Head of Hufflepuff and teaches Herbology.”

“Hello, Professor,” they chorus dutifully.

“No Madam Flint?” Sprout asks, “What did you do to deserve school shopping duty, Miss Black? Nevermind. Listen, I realize it’s a bit unorthodox, but would you mind keeping an eye on this lot for me? Just until Minerva can get here. There’s been an escape from one of my private greenhouses and I’m needed at the castle urgently.”

“Um,” says Narcissa.

“Perfect!” says Sprout, and Disapparates on the spot.

Narcissa looks at the Muggles and their children, and the Muggles and their children look at her.

“Right,” Narcissa says. “Right. Okay, I’m Narcissa Black. I’m a sixth year at Hogwarts and a Prefect for Slytherin, which is one of the four houses—did Professor Sprout go over them with you? You all have your lists? Excellent. All of the children will be putting together their own Potions kit from the items on the list. Knowing how to select quality ingredients will be important for them later, so if you or they have any questions please ask. These six,” she gestures at her own group, “Will also be first years at Hogwarts this fall. Be polite,” she warns them.

They nod meekly. Narcissa turns to smile at the Muggle parents. “Alright, let’s head inside.”

Everyone troops obediently after her and Narcissa immediately gives up on her plan to slip away to the basement. Her supervision is clearly needed here.

“Agravain, if you eat that scoop of beetle eyes I will be forced to inform your mother. I don’t care if Jeremiah dared you to.”

“Latona, stop trying to scare Delilah and put that pickled salamander down.”

“Muggle topics taught at Hogwarts? None of them are taught specifically, but magical classes incorporate them. Arithmancy, for example, includes math up through differential equations at a NEWT level—that’s like our version of a university certificate. Herbology and Care of Magical Creatures cover botany and zoology, respectively. We have a History class and there’s a lot of overlap there until 1692 when the Statute of Secrecy went into full effect. Transfiguration and Potions both include aspects of chemistry. Physics is covered to a certain extent by Astronomy. I suppose the curriculum is rather science-heavy, isn’t it? I’m glad you approve.”

_“I told you not to eat those beetle eyes.”_

“Your son will have plenty of career opportunities just by getting his OWLs—that’s our high school diploma. Mandatory education stops there, in fact. NEWTs are recommended if you’d like to get into management in the Ministry—yes, that’s our government—”

“Go find a pewter cauldron without a ding in it.”

“Did you make sure your scales are actually balanced?”

“Well, of course, you don’t feel well, I wouldn’t either if I’d eaten a tablespoon of beetle eyes. They’re not toxic, calm down.”

“What do I want to do when I graduate? I’ll be a housewife, I expect. Perhaps some philanthropy. It’ll depend on who I’m married to. What? Oh, arranged marriages are quite common among certain groups in our society and my family is quite influential.”

“My father says the Minister’s nose is so far up your uncle’s—” begins Delilah.

“That’s quite enough, Miss Fawley,” Narcissa interrupts hastily, giving the Muggle, a woman named Janet, who had asked a tight smile. “Politics are rather contentious at the moment.”

“I guess some things are the same no matter what, huh?” says Janet’s husband Rob.

“Does having no say in who you marry really not bother you?” another woman, this one named Diane, wants to know.

Narcissa shrugs. “I suppose it might if I’d ever expected anything different? I don’t have a contract at the moment, which is actually rather unusual. I have two older sisters though and neither of them have been married yet, which is part of it.”

“Andromeda eloped though,” Regulus pipes up. “Just this morning.”

The Muggles look appropriately shocked.

“It’s been a rather trying day,” Narcissa tells them.

She would have continued, but there’s an explosion close enough that the apothecary windows shatter and the walls shake.

“Is that normal?” Janet asks nervously.

“No,” says Narcissa. “Everyone down! Away from the door.”

“What if it’s Voldemort?” Regulus says fearfully.

“Who?” Rob wants to know.

“Ask Sprout or McGonagall, if she ever gets here,” says Narcissa, wishing desperately that the Transfiguration professor would arrive, especially considering the screaming and spell-casting she can hear. “Right now I want all of you to crawl to the back of the shop. There’s a hidden trap door in the corner by the tank of lionfish. Go through there. It’s where they keep the rarer ingredients. _Don’t touch anything._ ”

The Muggles nod and begin to herd their children toward the back corner. Narcissa is about to send her first years after them when a man bursts into the shop. He’s dressed all in black and wearing a mask that looks like a skull.

“Get out of the way,” he shouts at her, moving like he intends to shove her. “Your sister will kill me if you get hurt.”

No need to ask which sister that is. “If you know who I am, then you ought to know better than to mess with me,” Narcissa says, sounding much braver than she feels.

Another skull-masked man joins the first. “What are you waiting for?” he asks, “Get rid of her.”

Narcissa doesn’t move. They’ll have to go through her to get to either the children or the Muggles. She thinks she recognizes both of their voices, and that doesn’t bode well for anyone inside the shop.

“You deal with her,” the first man says. “I’m not going to get on Bellatrix’s bad side.”

He leaves to join the fray outside of the shop. The second man advances on Narcissa. “You think just because you’re a Black you’re safe, girlie?” he snarls.

“These children are under my protection,” she tells him and levels her wand at his heart.

He starts to lunge anyway, and Narcissa says a long string of Latin very fast that results in a lot of screaming. She’d botched it a little, and the results are actually worse than she’d intended.

“Non-consensual human transfiguration is illegal,” pipes up Barty Crouch Jr. from behind her.

“Then I suppose it’s lucky for me that your father doesn’t consider werewolves human, isn’t it?”

He squeaks in alarm. “Werewolves?”

Narcissa removes the now-unconscious man’s mask, revealing a face familiar to all of them from wanted posters.

“Greyback,” Jeremiah Flint breathes, scooting forward to see more clearly. “How’d you know?”

She’s not going to admit to having recognized the man’s voice because she’d met him before in front of the son of the Director of the Department of Law Enforcement, so she says “Get in the basement. This isn’t over yet.”

“Can’t,” Regulus informs her. “A shelf tipped over on the door and the cashier says any magic near the spilled ingredients might make them combust.”

Narcissa swears colorfully.


	3. my veins pump blood into my throat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from "I Said Hi" by Amy Shark

What is she supposed to do now? Narcissa lowers her wand so no one can see how badly her hands are shaking. This is starting to feel real in a way it hadn’t before. She had actually, almost properly, cursed somebody. That someone was Greyback, who was only debatably a person, but she’d cursed him. He was going to hurt her, or someone else, she reasons. She hadn’t had a choice. _He was going to hurt someone._ Oh, Merlin. She feels a little like she had been standing on a rug for her entire life and someone had just yanked it out from under her. He might have hurt her. He had even said that being a Black wouldn’t protect her. What would, then? It wasn’t the full moon, but what if it had been? What if he’d bitten her? What if she hadn’t been fast enough and he’d hurt Regulus?

Her reflexes, honed from years of exposure to dungbombs and Sirius, are still intact even though her skull feels like it’s been stuffed with cotton so when someone else bursts into the shop her wand snaps back up. She opens her mouth, not sure what curse or words are going to come out, but it’s just McGonagall.

“Miss Black!” the older woman exclaims, taking in Greyback’s prone form and the Muggles and children huddled behind Narcissa.

“Professor,” Narcissa says. “I’m actually glad to see you, for once.”

McGonagall peers through her spectacles at Greyback again. “What on Earth did you cast?” she asks, waving her wand experimentally over him.

“I tried to modify Felifors so it would work on a werewolf,” Narcissa tells her, adding quite unnecessarily, “It didn’t work.”

“Please stay after your first Transfiguration class this upcoming school year so you can explain to me what, exactly, you were thinking.”

“I’m not taking Transfiguration,” Narcissa says. “I only got an Acceptable on my OWLs.”

Does McGonagall look relieved? Narcissa thinks she might. Well. The feeling is mutual.

“In that case, see me after the Welcoming Feast and your Prefect duties are complete.”

Something occurs to her, and Narcissa snaps to attention. “Oh, fuck,” she says. “Aunt Walburga is going to kill me if anything happened to Sirius, so I might not be able to do that either. Did you see him? Can you watch this lot? I have to find him. And Potter. Aunt Dorea will flay someone.”

Leaving her first years, the Muggle-borns, and their parents with a slightly stunned looking McGonagall, Narcissa bolts out into the fray.

It isn’t much of a fray anymore. The people in skull masks have disappeared and the shoppers of Diagon Alley are slowly starting to emerge.

“Sirius?” she calls. “Sirius? Potter?”

There’s a pop behind her and she spins, wand raised, but it’s a crimson-robed Auror. His compatriots slowly pop into existence behind him.

“Real impressive response time, you lot,” she spits and continues on her way before they have a chance to respond. “Sirius? Where are you?”

Diagon Alley isn’t quite in smoking ruins, but if no one puts the fire in Potage’s Cauldron Shop before it spreads it might be. The Aurors seem to realize this because several of them start casting _Aguamenti _at it while the others start to shift rubble from destroyed stalls and collapsed walls.__

__“Do you need help looking, dear?” a woman asks, and it takes Narcissa a moment to place her as Molly Prewett, who had been a Gryffindor Prefect when Narcissa first arrived at Hogwarts._ _

__Molly Weasely, she reminds herself, warily eyeing the baby the other woman is holding. Madam Flint had already made her hold one, and that was quite enough for the day. She swears some more to herself. Madam Flint and the other children. How had she forgotten? Andromeda would probably start talking about a response to trauma or some such nonsense. Narcissa shakes herself. She’s better than that._ _

__“Have you seen Sirius Black and James Potter? Or Madam Flint? She was shopping with the older children today.”_ _

__Molly might have married a Weasley and, for the most part, abandoned the hoity-toity pureblood society she had never liked, but even she knew about Madam Flint. She tsks. “Poor dear. Yes, she’s fine. I was talking to her when the attack started, actually. My Bill here has been a tad colicky as well. I was telling her that a drop or two of Calming Drought on his pacifier calms him right now. She’s in the Leaky Cauldron now, helping the children through the Floo. I haven’t seen Black or Potter though.”_ _

__“I’ll keep looking,” Narcissa says. “Thank you. If you see Madam Flint again will you tell her that the first years and I are fine? They’re with McGonagall in Slug and Jigger’s.”_ _

__Molly nods and goes back to frowning at the smashed remains of the stall she sells produce and baked goods out of._ _

__Narcissa keeps walking, and she finally finds Sirius and his companions outside Quality Quidditch Supplies. She could kick herself. That ought to have been the first place she checked, honestly._ _

__“Narcissa!” Sirius exclaims. “Are you okay? Where’s Regulus?”_ _

__Despite the fact that they’re in public, Narcissa sweeps him into a bone-crushing hug. “Oh, thank Merlin. I was so worried,” she tells his shoulder._ _

__“Oof,” says Sirius because he’s been hit with Bludgers that were less forceful._ _

__She steps back and smoothes her robes before he can do something horrible like pat her back reassuringly. “Regulus is fine. He’s with McGonagall. We should go home before Aunt Walburga hears about this.”_ _

__Except she still hasn’t bought the supplies she needs to bind the toad demon and she still has to reunite her first years with Madam Flint. Damn it._ _

__“Oh, Merlin,” says Potter, who has gone pale behind his mustache. “My mother is going to flay me if she hears about this before I’m home. I have to go. See you at Hogwarts, Padfoot, Moony, Wormtail.”_ _

__They watch him hurry away. Pettigrew shakes his head. “Madam Potter is such a scary lady,” he says, then, “ _My_ mother is a scary lady too. I had better go.”_ _

__Narcissa and Sirius turn to look expectantly at Lupin, who shrugs. “My mother is dead,” he says. “And I expect my father will only be disappointed I didn’t manage to get myself killed.”_ _

__“Right,” says Narcissa because she doesn’t want to get into that, “In that case, you can come with us.”_ _

__Lupin shrugs, but trails after her when she grabs Sirius and starts to steer him back toward Slug and Jigger’s. She waves to Molly when they make their way back toward the apothecary. The other woman waves back but doesn’t look up from the man whose broken arm she’s healing._ _

__“Miss Black,” McGonagall says, then, “Potter and Pettigrew?”_ _

__“Headed home, Professor,” Sirius tells her. “Figured it was no good surviving this only for their mothers to kill them.”_ _

__Regulus takes that moment to launch himself at Sirius._ _

__“Oof,” Sirius says. “I know we all might’ve died, but these public displays of affection are positively un-Black-like. You’re good with healing spells, Moony, can you check to see if Reg and Narcissa have hit their heads? Moony?”_ _

__Lupin doesn’t respond, frozen and staring at Greyback’s mangled form. “Is he…”_ _

__“Still alive,” McGonagall informs him, face softening. “Although Miss Black’s spell would likely have killed him if not for his...condition.”_ _

__McGonagall doesn’t sound disapproving, which is a first when it comes to anything Narcissa has done._ _

__“I panicked,” Narcissa says. “Next time I’ll just Avada him, shall I?”_ _

__McGonagall touches the piece of iron she wears on a cord around her neck with the hand not clutching her wand at the mention of the Killing Curse. “You’re not funny, Miss Black, but I’m inclined to agree with you.”_ _

__Lupin keeps staring, only managing to tear his gaze away when Sirius wraps an arm around him and says in a low voice, “Hey, you’re safe. It’s August of 1971. You’re in Diagon Alley with me and McGonagall. Half his body is a cauldron. He can’t hurt you.”_ _

__Narcissa thinks she’s probably not supposed to be hearing any of that, so she turns to her first years. “Madam Flint is fine, as are your siblings. She’s in the Leaky Cauldron and I’m going to take you to her. The Aurors—our police,” she adds for the benefit of the listening Muggles, “—are here and putting the fires out.”_ _

__“I suppose it was too much to hope you wouldn’t have your own Troubles,” Rob says. “This Voldemort fellow, your government will catch him soon, won’t they?”  
Unless he buys them off, Narcissa thinks, unsure how much McGonagall had told them while she was gone, but she says, “I expect they will,” in her most reassuring voice._ _

__“Right, then,” says Janet. “Will we be able to finish our shopping? I took off work to be here.”_ _

__“Mum,” groans one of the girls, but the other parents appear up for it.  
McGonagall looks rather helplessly at Narcissa._ _

__“Oh no,” she says, her new-found truce with the Transfiguration professor be damned, “I’m going to return this lot to Madam Flint and then I have one errand that can’t wait and then I’m going home. We’ll try again later. Today has been quite enough.”_ _

__“One more errand?” Sirius demands. “What could you possibly—fuck. Really? You don’t have what you need?”_ _

__Narcissa, very aware of McGonagall’s curious gaze says, “Well, it’s not like I wanted it to come back, is it?”_ _

__“Can’t you just leave it for now?” asks Sirius._ _

__“And when is Aunt Walburga going to let us out of the house again?” Narcissa wants to know. “I’ll be lucky if she doesn’t start keeping me on a leash after Bellatrix and Andromeda ran off.”_ _

__McGonagall’s thin eyebrows climb higher on her forehead. Sirius looks around the apothecary, eyes catching on where the trap door to the basement is thoroughly covered in shelves and various ingredients. He sighs._ _

__“You’ll have to go to Knockturn, then. Take Regulus. Moony and I will take the first years back to Madam Flint. I’ll meet you in front of Borgin and Burke’s on the corner.”_ _

__Narcissa nods her assent and turns to go._ _

__“Goodbye, Miss Black,” her first years call, echoed a moment later by the Muggle-borns who have evidently decided this is the polite thing to do._ _

__“I won’t tell my father what you did to Greyback!” Crouch promises cheerfully.  
“It was nice to meet you,” says Janet, and the other Muggle parents nod._ _

__McGonagall sighs. “I’ll see you when school begins, Miss Black. You were very brave today and you did a good thing.”_ _

__Narcissa looks at Greyback’s body, feels ill, and hurries out of the shop. Regulus follows her, looking around the wreckage of Diagon Alley curiously._ _

__“When you bind that demon can I watch?” he asks. “I’ve been wanting to learn how.”_ _

__“Merlin help me,” Narcissa says. “I suppose.”_ _


	4. you can't break that which isn't yours

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> life hack: you don't have to write a transition if you just. end the chapter. title from "apres moi" by regina spektor.

The world’s longest day gets even longer when Narcissa turns the corner onto Knockturn Alley and is promptly grabbed and dragged into the gap between Borgin and Burke’s and Chadwick’s Chandlery.

“Hey!” says Regulus, who had been two steps behind her as they made their way toward the dingy street.

It’s just Bellatrix though, wearing uncharacteristically loose black robes and holding a skull mask. Narcissa doesn’t stop struggling when she realizes who it is, and is viciously pleased when one of her elbows connects with Bellatrix’s ribcage.

“Ouch,” Bellatrix says, “hold still, damn it. I just wanted to make sure you were alright. Rabastan said he left you alone with Greyback.”

“I’m fine,” Narcissa growls and stomps on her sister’s foot. “No thanks to you.”

Perhaps sensing the only thing she’s going to get for her troubles is more bruises, Bellatrix lets her go and raises her hands placatingly. “I didn’t know you were going to be in Diagon today. I would have warned you.”

“I could have been killed. Regulus could have been killed! And that’s all you have to say for yourself? You run off and join some filthy terrorist upstart and—”

Regulus, from where he has been studying some anatomically improbable graffiti, looks up when he hears his name. Seeing his cousins aren’t likely done to be done fighting any time soon, he goes back to wondering why, exactly, a hag would do _that_ with...a unicorn horn? An Erumpent horn? Maybe he’ll ask Sirius later.

“It’s actually more like a cult, it turns out,” Bellatrix says like that’s an improvement.

Narcissa growls, which Bellatrix somehow interprets as her cue to keep talking.

“I made a mistake. I know that now. I thought Voldemort was a Dark Lord and I wanted to study under him.”

“You’ve only been gone for half a day,” Narcissa points out, not at all mollified that she had been right about Bellatrix’s motives. “Changed your mind already?”

“I changed my mind before I left, actually,” Bellatrix retorts, and, seeing the obvious next question forming on her sister’s lips, displays her left forearm. “I had to go anyway. I need to know how to undo this.”

Narcissa stares at the brand. It’s a snake emerging from the mouth of a skull, both covered in binding runes that are partially obscured by the angry red furrows from where her sister has been scratching. It looks and smells infected. It’s—bad.

“Sweet Morgana,” she says, and doesn’t quite manage to suppress a shudder.

Bellatrix shrugs. “It’s not so bad. I could get rid of it now if I had to. I’d just lose my arm along with it.”

“Not so bad,” Narcissa echoes, grabbing her sister’s arm and turning it so she can examine the runes more closely. “You let him put this on you? Are you actually out of your mind? I know madness runs in our family but this is—”

“I thought he was a Dark Lord! A proper one. There hasn’t been on in Europe in nearly a century. That kind of research opportunity isn’t going to come around very often, if ever!”

“He’s not even a Dark Lord?” Narcissa demands, taking out a handkerchief to blot at the pus oozing from the scratches on her sister’s arm. “You should really see Andromeda about this.”

“He split his soul, he didn’t sell it,” says Bellatrix. She looks annoyed. “The idiot. No one will want it now.”

Narcissa doesn’t miss that she hadn’t said anything about seeing Andromeda, but she lets it go in light of what she’s saying about Voldemort.

“A Horcrux? Is he mad?”

“More than one, if he’s to be believed,” Bellatrix says, disgust evident, “It’s an affront to the natural order of things and anyone calling themselves a practitioner of the Dark Arts.”

“ _Episkey_ ,” Narcissa tries, but Bellatrix’s arm doesn’t change.

Her sister slaps her away. “The scratches and inflammation are disrupting the runes, stupid. Leave them alone.”

“You’re going to get _gangrene_. You’ll lose your arm anyway!”

“Don’t think I’m not considering just cursing it off,” says Bellatrix. “I don’t know if I can act like he impresses me long enough to get him to tell me how to remove it. It’s not like it’s my wand arm.”

“If you need help—”

“If I need help I’ll ask Andromeda. You should focus on school.”

Narcissa rolls her eyes. “I can’t believe you got yourself disowned over this.”

“Oh, no,” says Bellatrix. “I got myself disowned because I don’t want to marry Lestrange or Malfoy. As soon as I deal with the Dark Mark I’m going to Norway. I was accepted to the university in Oslo.”

“Which Uncle Orion would disown you for doing anyway,” Narcissa sighs, resigned.

“Exactly. Might as well get it over with. Now, what are you doing in Knockturn?”

Bellatrix is only too happy to help her when she explains about the toad demon. She changes into her customary, worryingly tight dress, stuffing the loose robes and skull mask into a pocket with an Undetectable Extension Charm on it. Her sister is not the kind of witch to suffer dresses without usable pockets. Narcissa admires that about her.

“Alright, you said you’d Summoned it before?” she asks as the emerge back onto Knockturn Alley proper.

Narcissa nods. “It’s the one I got the blood from that we used in the trap for Lucius. Which you still owe me for, by the way. I had actual plans beyond terrorizing some poor idiot.”

Bellatrix raises an eyebrow.

“Well, not that particular poor idiot.”

“That’s the Narcissa I know and love. On a first-name basis with the charming Mr. Malfoy, hmm? He likes you, you know. Didn’t even stare at my chest while I was talking to him. Do you know how long it’s been since a man has made eye contact with me? Quite refreshing,” now Bellatrix frowns. “Do you think he’s maybe not into witches? I should have asked. I would have introduced him to Evan.”

“He certainly wasn’t making eye contact with me when we first met,” Narcissa says dryly. “I think he’s just afraid of you. Also, Evan is dating the second oldest Montague boy, remember?”

Bellatrix harrumphs, but goes back to focusing on the demon. “It might just have taken a liking to you. Sometimes they do, you know,” she pats her pocket. “I have an imp that comes with me no matter where I go.”

A single eyestalk emerges from Bellatrix’s pocket and scans its surroundings.

“Hell must be pretty boring if it puts up with dress shopping,” Regulus says, finally feeling that it’s safe to talk without attracting the ire of either witch.

The eyestalk retreats. Evidently, they aren’t interesting enough to hold the imp’s attention.

“I don’t take nearly as long as Narcissa,” Bellatrix tells him primly, ignoring the imp.

“I once saw you spend forty-five minutes debating between two corsets and then you didn’t get either of them,” Narcissa reminds her.

“I remember that,” Regulus agrees. “Sirius fell asleep and the shop assistants had a contest to see who could put the most ribbons in his hair before he woke up.”

It had been a lot of ribbons if Narcissa is remembering that particular incident correctly.

She leads them into Wyrm’s Apothecary and Cauldrons. Binding a demon requires significantly more supplies than summoning or containing one briefly. She has a ritual knife, silver cauldron, and candles the right shade of scarlet, but she’s missing blood from a black goat, English thyme, iron filings, ibis feathers, and the branches from a willow tree growing by a stream of at least the third order. None of this is hard to bully the unfortunate William Wyrm into selling to her with Bellatrix looming behind her.

He almost, almost manages to escape the eldest Black sister’s wrath. Narcissa had been rooting for him, honestly. The longer they went without shouting at, cursing, or threatening him the more confident he became until—

“Will that be all, my lady?” asks the unfortunate William Wyrm in his oiliest voice, then he bows. His eyes are fixed firmly on Bellatrix’s chest.

Regulus closes his eyes, knowing what’s going to happen next. He’s fairly certain he’s never going to be able to date. Sirius insists he’ll be interested when he’s older, but girls are so _scary_. It’s easy for Sirius to tell him that he’ll be interested in girls someday, especially if what Jeremiah Flint says his older brother says about Sirius secretly—well, secretly for Hogwarts, anyway—dating his friend Lupin is true. _He_ doesn’t have to deal with girls.

The lecture that the unfortunate William Wyrm receives lasts for nearly half an hour. Bellatrix looks scary, with her too-numerous teeth and cold sneer, but the real danger lies in her capacity to rant.

“—objectify women, what are you, some kind of misogynist?”

“Magic is the great equalizer among genders, we shouldn’t have sex-based discrimination like the _Muggles_ we are _better than that_ —”

“Do I look at you like you’re a piece of meat to you? I don’t think so—”

“—condescending—”

“—not any way to talk to a witch, honestly!”

She is, actually, looking at the man like he’s a piece of meat. Or rather, like she would like to turn him into a piece of meat. Wisely, neither Narcissa nor Regulus points this out. Bellatrix is nearly unstoppable when she gets going, and it isn’t like either of them disagree with her.

He’s only spared Bellatrix’s recommended reading list by Narcissa tugging at her arm.“We have to go home,” she reminds her sister. “Aunt Walburga will be furious enough as it is.”

This fails to impress Bellatrix, but she lets Narcissa steer her out of the store. “I’ll remember that. _My lady_. I hate that shit. It makes my skin crawl.”

“I know,” Narcissa soothes, casting her eyes skyward in a silent plea for patience, “Believe me, I know.”


	5. you'll never learn a thing if you bail out now

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title from 'wrong girl' by missy higgins

Bellatrix ruffles Regulus’s hair which prompts a squawk, she gives Narcissa’s shoulder a squeeze, and then she Disapparates before she’s forced into an emotional goodbye. Narcissa rolls her eyes, but she can’t be too irritated. She hadn’t known how worried she’d been until she’d seen her sister in the flesh, horrible tattoo, bad attitude, and all. It was good to know Bellatrix was alright, if in even more trouble than usual. Andromeda was likely fine as well, being, as much as it pained Narcissa to admit it, the most responsible of the three sisters. Sensible people didn’t curse werewolves or bind demons.

Narcissa sighs to herself as she leads Regulus to where Sirius is waiting for them, hands shoved in pockets and somehow managing to look like he isn’t loitering.

“Ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” he grumbles. “Mother is going to be impossible.”

Business as usual, then. She’s so ready for this day to be over. Diagon Alley is almost back to normal when they walk through on their way to the Leaky Cauldron, albeit a little more singed than it had been at the start of the day. Most of the rubble has been cleared, and there are shoppers about, looking only a little more cautious than usual.

The Muggle parents had evidently bullied McGonagall into letting them finish their shopping because several of them wave enthusiastically when they spot her as Narcissa leads her cousins by Madam Malkin’s. McGonagall just looks long-suffering, even after Sirius blows her a kiss.

They make it through the Leaky Cauldron’s Floo without incident and emerge into the blessedly sitting room of Grimmauld Place. Narcissa lets out a breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding.

“Right,” she says, and claps Sirius on the shoulders. “Being the Heir and all, you really ought to deal with your mother. I have a demon to bind and I promised I’d show Regulus.”

She drags Regulus out of the room and up the steps before Sirius can do more than sputter in outrage. “Thank you,” says Regulus. “I really wasn’t looking forward to that.”

“Being the youngest sibling does have occasional perks,” Narcissa tells him, steering him into her room. “Now, about that demon.”

There’s actually rather a lot that goes into demonology, which is alright because it happens to be one of Narcissa’s main passions. Most things that fall under the umbrella of Care of Magical Creatures are, although she’d only gotten an E on her OWL. Really, it was unreasonable for students to be expected to memorize anything related to taxonomy, especially because even experts in the field don’t necessarily agree on anything. No one was even sure whether dragons should be considered reptiles, given their warm-blooded nature, but it’s not as if they were birds either so—

Regulus’s eyes are starting to glaze over, though the toad demon is nodding as much as a creature that’s basically a lumpy American football with a face can nod, like it thinks she’s making a good point. Narcissa eyes it suspiciously. She hadn’t thought it was powerful enough to form its own opinions, but who knew? Demonology was an art, not a science.

“I digress,” Narcissa says. “Would you mind getting my silver cauldron down off that shelf? The first step is to build a fire out of willow branches harvested from a tree by a stream. I’m using branches from the bank of a third-order stream—do you know about the Strahler stream order?”

Regulus shakes his head, handing her the cauldron.

Narcissa sets it next to the large patch of stone she’s peeled up her carpet to reveal, and grabs a piece of parchment it’s easiest to explain how stream orders work with a sketch. “So, a first-order stream is one that bubbles up from a spring or forms from glacial meltwater, for example, without another stream feeding into it. Two first-order streams come together to form a second-order stream. Two second-order streams come together to make a third-order stream, and so on. Why do think that’s what I’m using?”

Her cousin tilts his head, obviously thinking hard. “Three is a stable number?”

“A point for Slytherin,” Narcissa says. “That’s part of it, although if I’m basing this purely off of Arithmancy, why not go for a seventh order stream? Thirteenth?”

Regulus shrugs, and hazards, “There’s less interference with lower numbers?”

“No credit for that one, I’m afraid. Branches from higher-order streams are actually more powerful because of the chaos inherent in so many different waters mixing. Demons are a powerful chaotic force in and of themselves, and higher orders help us match that. The more powerful the demon you’re attempting to bind, the higher the stream order you’d want to use. There’s a problem with that though. Stream orders don’t go up indefinitely. What order do you think the Amazon is?”

“Fortieth?”

“Twelfth,” Narcissa corrects. “In the higher orders, since there’s so few of them, you’re also limited in what woods you can use by what grows where the streams are. I’m using willow because of its associations with stability and harmony, but it really depends on what you’re trying to imbue into your relationship with the demon.”

Regulus looks like he’s starting to regret asking her to show him a demon binding. To be fair, he’s eleven and has never expressed much interest in demons prior to this. Narcissa takes pity on him.

“Alright. We build the fire out of our carefully selected wood, then light these scarlet candles—they have to be this color to correctly balance the energies at play—from the fire. Then you set one in each of the four cardinal directions. Next step, mix blood from a black goat because it’s traditional with thyme in the cauldron on your fire. I’m using the English variety to symbolize strength of will. It’s meant to prevent the demon you’re binding from gaining control of you.”

“Is that a big risk?” Regulus asks, looking concerned.

Narcissa waves a hand. “Only sometimes. Anyway, add iron filings to your herbs and blood and stir clockwise with your ritual knife until the mixture is smoking. Take the cauldron off the fire, and when it’s cooled enough that you aren’t burning yourself when you touch it, dip an ibis feather in the mixture and use it to draw the runes for obedience and loyalty in your language of choice around the circle you’re keeping the demon in and the runes for safety and protection in the same language on your chest. Also whatever other runes you want to throw in there. Use a different ibis feather for every rune.”

She takes a moment to mourn for her sheets while the mixture cools because the demon is still encased in a salt circle on her bed. Oh, well. Sometimes sacrifices had to be made. She uses Marcomannic runes, drawing them around the demon, over and over until they blend together into one big triangle, then she scrawls them onto her chest. The blood mixture is still warm.

“Being able to write your runes correctly upside down is an essential skill,” she informs a slightly nauseous-looking Regulus. “Now, you have to say the activation phrase before the blood dries. Watch the runes closely.”

Regulus nods and fixes his eyes on the triangle around the demon.

“ _Non erit tibi_ ,” Narcissa intones, and the runes around the demon glow, rising up and constricting around the demon’s neck like a collar before fading from sight. They leave ashy ghosts of themselves on her sheets. The runes on her chest burn as they sink into her skin, and suddenly she can feel the demon’s presence, almost like it’s still sitting on her chest again.

Regulus’s eyebrows have gone up. “That was pretty cool,” he decides.

“If I’ve done everything right, when I break the salt line it won’t attack me.”

Narcissa does just that. The demon steps out of the circle with as much dignity as anything toad-shaped can muster, but it doesn’t lunge for her throat or make any other drastic moves.

“What if it’s waiting until you’re not suspicious?” Regulus wants to know, which is a pretty excellent question.

Narcissa shrugs. “Then it was smarter than me and I wasn’t competent to do the ritual correctly.”

“Huh,” says Regulus thoughtfully. “I think I’ll stick with Quidditch, as far as hobbies that might kill me go.”

“Binding a demon shouldn’t be something you do often,” Narcissa assures him. “Even if you were to get into demonology. Remember what Bellatrix said? Sometimes demons just decide they’re going to hang around you, which isn’t safe unless they’re bound. That’s what happened with this one. I Summoned it before because I needed a few drops of demon’s blood for a...project. It wasn’t supposed to come back.”

The toad demon croaks and shows them its teeth.

“Oh, yes. I bet you feel very clever, don’t you?” Narcissa asks it. “Come here. I have to introduce you to Kreacher so he doesn’t try to banish you. We can get you something to eat while we’re in the kitchen.”

Another croak, this one satisfied.

“Have fun with that,” says Regulus. “I’m going to go check on Sirius.”

“No need,” says Sirius, throwing the door open dramatically. “I’m here to inform you that we’re all grounded. Especially you, Narcissa. Apparently they’re still trying to undo what you did to Greyback and Mother isn’t pleased you cast illegal magic in public. Seems to think it wasn’t suitably subtle for a Black.”

Their entire family is about as subtle as a Bludger to the chest or a brick through a window, but whatever. Narcissa had been expecting it. “It wasn’t technically illegal,” she mutters. “And Greyback isn’t exactly a loss to society, is he?”

“What about our school supplies?” Regulus frets.

“Aunt Druella is getting them at some point, so if you have robe preferences—”

Regulus is already out the door. “I hate velvet,” he yells over his shoulder, because he’s secretly just as fussy about clothes as Bellatrix, “I have to remind her.”

“Ask her for a set of fleece-lined pajamas!” Narcissa calls after him. “And slippers! The dungeons get cold in the winter.”

“So sure he’ll be a Slytherin?” Sirius asks, voice somewhere between teasing and bitter.

“After how your mother reacted to your Sorting? He’s got a better sense of self-preservation than that, and that’s definitely a Slytherin trait.”

Sirius sighs and pushes the door to her bedroom closed. He looks like he has something to say, so Narcissa settles onto her bed, cross-legged. She waits expectantly, although evidently doesn’t manage to look patient enough because Sirius says, “Give me a second, alright? I don’t know how to say this.”

She and the toad demon watch him pace for a few moments. “Is this about Lupin?” she asks finally.

“How much do you know?”

“How much do you want me to know?” Narcissa counters. “That you’re dating? That he’s a werewolf?”

Sirius deflates like all of the air has gone out of him. It looks like most of the fight has, at any rate, because he slouches against the wall and slides to the floor. “Do you hate me?” he asks.

Narcissa has had more emotions today than she’s ever had before, probably in her entire life, and this conversation looks like it’s going to involve a lot more of them. Having had the opportunity to compare them, she thinks she might prefer how terrified she’d been facing Greyback over how utterly heartbreaking Sirius looks right now.

“Of course not,” she tells him. “I don’t hate Bellatrix or Andromeda, do I?”

When she’s had time to properly process things she might resent them to hell and back, but she doesn’t hate them. They’re family, and that means something.

Sirius doesn’t look reassured. “I’m—Merlin, Cissy. If Mother knew—”

“We’ll just have to make sure she doesn’t,” Narcissa says, managing not to twitch when he uses her childhood nickname. So far today she’s legally become an only child and faced a werewolf. What’s keeping a secret from her aunt compared to that? “I’m not going to lose you.”

He nods like he’s trying to use the gesture to pull himself together. It doesn’t seem to be working. “Thank you,” he says finally.

“You can stay in here for a bit,” she tells him. “If you need some time. I have to introduce my new friend here to Kreacher, and no one will think to look for you in my room.”

The toad demon, which had remained politely quiet throughout their conversation, lets out a croak.

Sirius laughs a little weakly. “I think I’ll take you up on that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> let me know if you spot any spelling/grammar stuff because i've apparently just been spelling Andromeda however i feel like so


	6. you'd be a lion if you knew you could fight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter title from "choke" by sheppard.
> 
> also i'm back? i've been doing original writing (almost done with the second draft of my first novel!) so that's where i've been. hope you're all safe and well!

Narcissa wakes up with a scream caught in her throat right before Greyback’s teeth close around Regulus’s neck. It was just a dream, she tells herself. So obviously a dream. They’d been in Madam Puddifoot’s and she’d been wearing a dress so heavy with pink frills and pearls that she’d been unable to move in time to reach Regulus. It was a dream. She would never wear something so ostentatious and hadn’t been to Madam Puddifoot’s in years and yet—

 _You think you’re safe?_ The Greyback in her dream had asked.

She lies still, muscles locked by fear. She’s struggling to get enough air into her lungs, not calm enough to rationalize the fact that nothing will kill her if she moves or noisily hyperventilates. Something wet wiggles in her right ear, which is the motivation she needs to unfreeze. She sits up, grabbing her wand—she always feels better when she has a wand in her hand—and jerks away from the sensation. She meets the golden eyes of the toad demon. It licks its lips.

“Disgusting,” she tells it, scrubbing away the demon saliva in her ear with a pillowcase. “Do you cause nightmares, or do you just feed on them?”

It shows its teeth, which Narcissa takes to mean it just eats them when they happen. She sighs. A shame. If it had been causing them it might have taken requests. She would much rather dream about turning up to an exam naked and without her wand than dream of watching Regulus die. Again. For the third time this week. She should probably get up, but she still feels sick and shaky from the dream so she flops back down on her bed and cocoons herself in blankets. The toad demon sighs to itself, evidently bored, and trundles away to amuse itself elsewhere.

For the briefest moment, Narcissa feels almost at peace. She can feel her heartbeat slowing and her muscles relaxing. Her eyes are just beginning to drift closed when something occurs to her. She’d forgotten, given all of the other anxieties she has and the sleep she isn’t getting, that today is September 1st.

As if on cue, someone knocks on her door. “Time to get up,” says her mother. “Are you packed? You don’t want to miss the Express.”

“I’m up,” she says, instead of pointing out that she’s successfully been on time for the Express for five years in a row, even the year she, Sirius, and her sisters were all at Hogwarts together.

That had, perhaps not coincidentally, been the year McGonagall found her first gray hair.

Narcissa drags herself out of bed. She isn’t even remotely close to being packed, and it’s already nine o’clock, which means any semblance of organization is already out the window. She digs around in her trunk until she has a crumpled white blouse, a wrinkled gray wool skirt, a Slytherin tie with a grease stain on it, and one gray knee sock.

The demon, which had evidently been under her bed, emerges with the other sock in its mouth, and a dust bunny stuck to its head.

“Thank you,” she says, reaching for the sock.

Unimpressed, the demon slurps and swallows, consuming the sock without chewing.

Right. Tights it is. Despite the fact that she’s lost weight in the weeks since the attack on Diagon Alley, her tights are too small. They’re also full of runs, but that’s fairly simple to repair. Her skirt, meanwhile, gapes unattractively around the waist and is going to require a belt to fix.

“You are so lucky you don’t have to wear clothes,” she mutters to the demon, who blinks in a manner she interprets as smug. “Forget my NEWTs, I’m going to spend this year learning tailoring charms. Remind me to check the library when we get to Hogwarts.”

Speaking of Hogwarts, she was going to have to figure out what to do with the demon. Summoning one isn’t technically illegal—it's a civil offense, not a criminal one, although owning any materials pertaining to the summoning is, in fact, criminal. Binding a demon isn't illegal, although it is incredibly ill-advised. The laws around the matter are complicated, and Narcissa ignores them for the most part.

Aloud, she asks, “I don’t suppose you’d let me disguise you as a cat.”

If the demon had eyebrows it would have raised one. That was a no, then.

“Fine. I’m telling everyone you’re a cane toad though.”

Inadvisably and only because she’s in a hurry, Narcissa summons her Hogwarts supplies from wherever they might be in the house. She immediately has to dive to the side to avoid being impaled by a quill and is left with a pile of parchment, books, clothes, and various odds and ends. She dumps the pile into her trunk and tries to slam the lid. It refuses to close all the way. She has to lean on it with her entire weight to get the latch to click.

Narcissa levitates the trunk down the hallway and then down the stairs to the foyer, trailed by the toad demon. It waddles obediently and without protest. She doesn’t trust it in the least. Her suspicions are confirmed when she sets the trunk down and turns to scoop the demon up, only to discover that it has vanished. Kreacher shrieks several moments later.

“Nasty beast!” he cries. “Miss Narcissa’s horrible pet is eating the bacon!”

She hurries to rescue the toad demon and any remaining bacon—there’s no question that Kreacher would win if it came down to a fight and there’s no use antagonizing her aunt this early in the morning—but breakfast is already a lost cause and the demon has found a relatively safe perch on Uncle Orion’s head. Narcissa is quite certain that, had it been any other member of the family, Kreacher would have risked taking a swing at it with a broom anyway.

Her uncle, a devout coffee drinker and slightly hard of hearing—a fact that’s probably saved his and Aunt Walburga’s marriage—doesn’t appear to have noticed the demon sitting on his head. “More coffee?” he asks Kreacher a little plaintively.

The house elf complies, still glaring at the demon. Aunt Walburga rolls her eyes. “Is Regulus ready to go?” she inquires.

Narcissa manages to resist asking how she’s supposed to know, snags some toast, and goes to check. She passes Sirius in the hall. He looks rumpled and is still in his pajamas.

“Are you packed?”

“Shit.” Sirius turns around and returns to his room.

That would be a no. She continues down the hall, finally pausing to knock twice on Regulus’s door. He jerks it open before she can knock a third time. He yawns. “What’s the matter?”

Narcissa is ready to shake him until she sees the smile he’s trying and failing to suppress. “You’re a brat,” she tells him, not without affection. “Are you packed?”

He nods, bouncing a bit on the balls of his feet. “I’ve been packed for days! I can’t wait.”

“You’re not worried about your Sorting?” Narcissa asks and immediately regrets it when his face falls.

“I am. Do you—can I ask—“

Narcissa nods, unsure where this is going. “Of course.”

“Should I ask the Hat to put me in Gryffindor?”

That isn’t what Narcissa had been expecting him to ask. Quite the opposite, actually. She’d been almost prepared to reassure him that he was Slytherin material, that there was no need to worry about his Sorting.

“Do you want to be in Gryffindor?” she asks, trying to buy herself some time to think.

“I thought—well. I thought if I was in Gryffindor too that maybe Mother would be less angry with Sirius.”

It makes sense, Narcissa supposes, but—

“Don’t.” Unbeknownst to either of them, Sirius had come to lean against the doorframe. “It’s not worth it, Reg. That spiteful old cu—” Narcissa coughs pointedly, and he clears his throat. “Our sainted, loving mother will be horrible to me no matter what. Don’t give her an excuse to hurt you too.”

“Are you sure?” Regulus asks, looking at his brother with wide eyes. “I could—”

“He’s right,” Narcissa says. “Don’t give her a reason. Not that she needs one, but you’re the only one left in her good graces. You can use that.”

Regulus glances between them. Narcissa isn’t sure what he’s looking for or if he finds it, but he nods slowly. “Slytherin it is.”

“Go and have breakfast,” Narcissa tells him. “It’s a long train ride and you’ll get sick of all you eat is sweets. I’ll bring your trunk down.”

Regulus traipses down the stairs obediently, leaving her with Sirius. He sighs heavily. “I worry about him.”

“Too soft?” Narcissa asks, having thought the same thing several times over the past eleven years.

Sirius shakes his head. “Too kind.”

“Is there a difference?”

“He cares about the little things, but he doesn’t lack backbone or conviction.”

“Might be better if he did.”

“Might be,” Sirius agrees. “It really might be.”

Narcissa takes the opportunity to stick her demon in Sirius’s trunk with the promise that she’ll retrieve it after the feast and an admonishment to behave that it will likely ignore. They then make their way downstairs in silence, both calmly submitting to Walburga’s monitoring and tracking spells before Flooing to Platform 9 3/4. Narcissa goes first. There’s a bit of a queue, which means she spends several moments hovering in a warm, vaguely green state of nonbeing while the network waits for her destination to clear. She doesn’t envy whatever poor sod is on duty directing Floo traffic for the King’s Cross point on September 1st. Eventually, the fireplace spits her out along with her luggage and she scrambles out of the way. Two more people come through, followed by Regulus. She drags him clear of the Floo unloading zone.

Four more people come through. Narcissa realizes that she’s tapping her foot and has to force herself to stop. A dark-haired form begins to spin into existence and her heart leaps, but the fireplace spits out James Potter. He blinks at her.

“Where’s Sirius?”

“Still trying to get through,” Narcissa says instead of articulating her worries about leaving Sirius alone with his mother or explaining her growing guilt for not letting him go through first. She can take whatever vitriol or curses Walburga feels like throwing. Sirius is fourteen. He shouldn’t have to.

Thankfully, he’s is the next one through the Floo. He has a cut in his eyebrow that’s bleeding sluggishly but appears otherwise unharmed. “Hey, mate,” Potter says. “Are you alright?”

“ _Tergeo. Episkey,_ ” Narcissa mutters, cleaning away the blood and then healing the cut. “What did you do? She doesn’t usually hit you where it shows.”  
Potter looks extremely uncomfortable being privy to their family drama, nevermind that his mother is one of Walburga and Orion’s cousins and is therefore perfectly aware of what the Black family is like. “I’ll just go find a compartment, look for Remus and Peter.”  
“No, I’ll come with,” Sirius waves off Narcissa’s fussing, explaining, “she’s still angry that I helped Andromeda and Bellatrix get away. Pitched a vase at me. I cursed her before she could do anything else. Uncle Orion will find her in a couple of hours if she’s lucky.” He sounds pleased with himself.

“Anything permanent?” Narcissa resigns herself to asking.

“If only.” Sirius ruffles Regulus’s hair and leads Potter off. “Enjoy the feast, Reg!” he calls back over his shoulder.

Narcissa turns to drag Regulus and their luggage onto the train, only to discover that she’s attracted a small audience of Muggles and first year students. She recognizes them from Diagon Alley.

“Miss Black, it’s good to see you,” says Janet.

Her husband, Rob, nods in agreement. He’s eyeing her wand. “You lot must have doctors, don’t you? Is that a good career?” He must have seen her fix Sirius’s cut.

“Dad,” groans one of the children.

“We call them healers, but yes. It’s a difficult educational tract. Quite prestigious.”

“Hear that? You could still be a doctor.”

Rob and Janet’s daughter heaves a big sigh. “I already told you, I want to be a singer.”

“Hogwarts has an excellent choir, although it’s extracurricular and not a class,” Narcissa interrupts what sounds like a well-worn argument. She counts the first years. “You all made it to the platform alright?”

The Muggles nod. “I will say, that barrier was a bit unnerving,” one of the women says.

“I could use a drink,” agrees Janet.

Narcissa looks at the clock. “The train is leaving in twenty minutes, so you ought to start saying your goodbyes.” Reluctantly, she adds, “I’ll help them with their luggage.”

“Oh, Miss Black, thank goodness,” says a voice behind her, and Narcissa turns to see Madam Flint.

“Good morning, madam,” she says politely, eyeing the children surrounding the other woman. Barty Crouch Jr. has the nerve to wave cheerfully at her.  
“I hate to impose, but would you find keeping an eye on the first years again? It’s just that I worry about them and you’re a Prefect…”

And that’s how Narcissa finds herself applying feather-light charms to trunks and shepherding fourteen eleven-year-olds into an open train compartment fifteen minutes later. It’s not all of the new first years by any means—Hogwarts seems to have three times as many half-bloods as Muggleborns, and there’s usually a dozen children a year from lesser-known pureblood families—but it’s more than she had been expecting to be saddled with.

There’s no sign on the compartment she settles them in, but there doesn’t have to be. It’s traditionally and indisputably the domain of the elder Slytherin girls. Aunt Walburga controls all of her communication over the summer, so she isn’t sure how many of her fellow sixth years or the seventh years will be returning. The majority of girls are officially betrothed the summer they receive their OWL results and pulled out of school to learn how to manage a household until they turn seventeen when they’re married. Narcissa counts herself lucky to be returning; she’s grateful that Abraxas Malfoy seems to be dragging his feet arranging her betrothal to Lucius. She supposes he hadn’t decided which Black sister to choose, but now she’s the only option left.

Fatima Shafiq is already reclining in a corner reading, but she looks up when Narcissa enters. “Goodness, Narcissa,” she drawls. “Are you trying to start a Quidditch league? It appears to be wearing on you.”

“Hello, Fatima. You must have frightened away all of your suitors if you’re back for another year,” she says to the seventh year and then directs a question to the assembled first years. “Are we having a friendly conversation?”

They all eye her skeptically as if they’re afraid this is a trick question. “No?” ventures Janet and Rob’s daughter.

“And why is that?” Narcissa prompts. “Miss…?”

“Elizabeth Keene,” the girl replies. “And she said you look tired which is true, but rude to say. And you said no boys like her. That’s rude too, even if she was mean first. And I bet it’s not even true since she’s so pretty.”

Fatima gives a single, slow blink. “Blunt little thing, isn’t she?” she remarks.

Keene frowns at her with all of the outrage she can muster. “You should be nicer to Miss Black,” she says severely. “She saved us from a werewolf this summer.”

“Still can’t believe werewolves are real,” mutters one of the other Muggle-born students.

Fatima raises both of her eyebrows at Narcissa, who delicately raises a shoulder. The older girl sighs. “Peace, little one. Narcissa and I are friends. You can tell because we’re on a first-name basis and because our body language is relaxed.”

“That could be an act,” Jeremiah Flint points out. “Maybe you want us to think you’re friends. And anyway, you could have been using first names to be rude.”

“A point to—well, whichever house you end up in,” Narcissa tells him. “Which is why you should observe more interactions until you’re sure how we feel about one another. You’re all young; you wouldn’t want to get between us if we were going to fight.”

Keene’s eyes dart between them. She looks like she’s trying to picture them fighting. Narcissa, aware that she’s unhealthily pale and more bony than fine-boned, knows that she doesn’t look the type to throw a punch. Fatima, with her shiny dark hair in an elaborate braid and a neat manicure, doesn’t look particularly threatening either. “Okay,” she says doubtfully. “Is it really rude to call people by their first names? We’ve all been doing it,” she gestures at the other first years.

“It implies a level of familiarity that it’s rude to assume,” Fatima explains. “Decide what to call someone based on the way they introduce themselves. Watch us,” she instructs, turning to Narcissa. “I am Fatima Shafiq.”

Narcissa bobs a shallow curtsey. “A pleasure, Miss Shafiq. I’m Narcissa Black.”

“Pretend I curtsied back,” Fatima tells the first years drily. “It’s lovely to meet you, Miss Black. Please, call me Fatima.”

“Then you must call me Narcissa,” says Narcissa. She turns to the first years. “If someone gives their last name, use that until they say otherwise. Call them miss or mister if you’re feeling exceptionally polite.”

“There are more nuances, which all of you ought to remember,” Fatima says, directing that last bit to the purebloods. “But no one will expect those of you from Muggle backgrounds to have all of that memorized on the first day. Any of you sorted into Slytherin will be subjected to lessons with Narcissa, as she’s the eldest female Slytherin Prefect.”

“Hypatia didn’t come back?” Narcissa asks.

“Married a Rowle. I’m the only returning seventh year, as far as I know.”

The compartment door slams open, making the first years jump before Narcissa can reply. She smiles when she sees who it is. “Hecate, Arachne!”

“Narcissa!” they exclaim in unison. Slightly more subdued, they add, “Fatima.”

Hecate Carrow and Arachne Greengrass—Narcissa’s best friends and fellow sixth years—smile at the first years.

“Well, look at you all!” Hecate says. “More than usual this year. I’m Hecate Carrow.”

“Hello, Miss Carrow,” they chorus when Fatima raises an eyebrow at them.

“Very good,” she murmurs and goes back to her book.

“Narcissa taught you manners already?” Arachne asks. “Impressive. I’m Arachne Greengrass.”

“Hello, Miss Greengrass.”

“Excellent,” she says and frowns. “You, are you wearing trainers?”

The boy in question looks alarmed to be singled out. “Uh, yes. Um. Miss Greengrass.”

“Why?”  
“Oh, leave him alone,” Narcissa says. “The ones that don’t look like older siblings you know are all Muggle-born, except that one,” she points at Crouch. “He’s an only child. That’s Barty Crouch Jr.”

Arachne surveys them. “Let’s see, we have Black, of course, you must be Regulus. Another Flint, Travers, Selwyn, Crouch you just said, and...Fawley?” Delilah Fawley nods. “A pleasure,” says Arachne. “You ought to make yourselves comfortable. It’s a long trip.”

As is the nature of eleven-year-olds, they’re soon playing a very large, combustible game of Exploding Snap and chattering about houses and classes and what so-and-so’s older sibling said about one professor or another. This gives Narcissa a chance to catch up with Arachne and Hecate.

“Did you really curse a werewolf?”

“Was Walburga as terrible as usual this summer?”

“Are you out of your mind?”

“Did Bellatrix—”

“Did Andromeda—”

Narcissa answers their questions as best she can while keeping an eye on Severus Snape, who had slipped into the compartment shortly after the first years started their game. He doesn’t appear to be causing trouble, paging through a gigantic tome about potions. He’s probably hiding from the other fourth-years, so she leaves him alone. She’ll chase him off the moment he snaps at one of the first years though.

“How was your summer?” she finally has a chance to ask.

Arachne promptly bursts into tears, startling the rest of the compartment into momentarily silence until a stack of Exploding Snap cards explodes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Interested in following me on social media? You can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/PeonyPrice) or [Tumblr](https://peonyprice.tumblr.com/). Thanks for reading!


	7. i'm that knife in your boot (girl i got ya)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a brief update and an even briefer message: trans women are women. trans men are men. nonbinary identities are valid. everyone deserves equal, affordable access to quality healthcare. 
> 
> title from "trouble" by valerie broussard, which has been stuck in my head for roughly two weeks.

Snape puts up a silencing charm with a disgusted wave of his wand and goes back to his book. Narcissa looks helplessly at Hecate. “Should I not have asked?”

Hecate puts up her own silencing charm while Fatima snaps at the first years to mind their own business. They refocus on their game of Exploding Snap, although Narcissa can see them sending occasional furtive glances Arachne’s way.

“The Yaxleys broke off the engagement,” Hecate tells her, wrapping an arm around Arachne’s shoulders when she starts to cry harder.

“And?” Narcissa asks, trying and failing to find a kind way to phrase her thoughts on the matter. “Corban wasn’t exactly a catch.”

Fatima whacks her on the shoulder. “Have some sympathy.”

Committed now, Narcissa refuses to back down. “He was petty and cruel and she’s better off without him.”

“He could have been worse,” Arachne finally manages around sniffles.

Narcissa supposes he could have been, but isn’t overly concerned until Hecate says, “he was better than Rabastan Lestrange.”

“Is your father out of his mind?” she demands.

Corban Yaxley is petty and cruel. Rabastan Lestrange is healthy, handsome, and second in line to the Lestrange fortune. He’s also twice their age and unmarried for a reason; no one had wanted to give him their daughter, even in a society where pureblood girls were treated little better—and often worse—than horses with impressive pedigrees. She thinks back to him standing next to Greyback at the apothecary and can’t quite suppress a shudder.

“Maybe the rumors are exaggerated?” Arachne offers, although her red, puffy eyes say she believes otherwise.

“Bellatrix is—was—betrothed to Rodolphous And she didn’t seem upset. Are the brothers really so bad?” Hecate inquires. “They’re certainly easy on the eyes.”

Bellatrix is both willing and capable of turning a man inside out with some sort of esoteric 8th-century combat spell and, from the few interactions Narcissa had observed between her and Rodolphous, had likely offered to demonstrate. “Men are...afraid of Bellatrix,” she says. “I can owl her and ask if you’d like. If he really is as bad as they say we’ll find a way to get you out of it though.”

“Do you think you can?” Arachne asks.

Narcissa doesn’t know if she can, but she knows that she will. The hope starting to spark her in her friend's eyes is a guarantee of that, even if she has to kill Rabastan herself to make it happen. Aloud, she asks, “what do your parents think about Voldemort?”

Hecate inhales so sharply that she ends up choking on her own saliva. Fatima drops her book. “You can’t just say that,” she hisses while Hecate coughs.

Arachne is so shocked that she stops crying, so Narcissa counts it as a win. “Who’s going to stop me? And besides, there’s a silencing ward up.”

Before Fatima can lecture anymore, the door to their car bursts open, and Sirius appears, brandishing the toad demon in front of him. His eyes flick to Snape and Narcissa knows he dearly wants to make a comment about there only being first years and girls in the car. Wisely, he doesn’t. Narcissa would absolutely rat him out to Bellatrix. Hecate drops the silencing charm. “Mr. Black,” she says politely. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”

“You lot,” Fatima snaps at the first years. “Pay attention.”

“Oh, so now you want our attention,” one of them mutters.

They all look up from their game though, eyes widening either at the scene before them or the look on Fatima’s face. She’s never been one to tolerate backtalk.

Sirius blinks, taking in the audience. The toad demon uses his distraction to wriggle free and waddle over to Narcissa. It hops up into her lap and hunkers down. She frowns at her cousin. “What did you do to it?”

“What did I do to it? What do I do to _it_? That creature is a menace.”

“Is that an—ah,” Fatima pauses delicately.

“Cane toad, yes,” Narcissa says, deadpan.

“Yes, of course. Now that you mention it, I can tell by the teeth and the way it smells of sulfur.”

Elizabeth Keene peers over disapprovingly. “Those are invasive.”

“Not when there’s only one of them,” Narcissa tells her. The girl wrinkles her nose.

“It’s...cute?” Delilah Fawley offers. “What’s its name?”

Narcissa’s mind goes conveniently blank. Thankfully, Regulus pipes up. “His name is Trevor.”

That’s a terrible name for a toad and an even worse one for a demon. “Yes,” Narcissa’s traitorous mouth agrees. “Trevor.”

Sirius stares at her like she’s lost her mind. “Anyway,” he says. “It was throwing a fit in my luggage and bit Moony, so.”

“Oh, is he alright?” Narcissa asks. “I don’t know if it’s venomous or not.”

The first years that had been gradually drifting closer with the intent of petting the toad demon pause. Sirius shrugs. “Hasn’t swelled up or anything. I think it took offense to, well. You know.”

To the fact that Lupin is a werewolf and therefore a dark creature. The toad demon must have been feeling territorial. “Find me if it does,” she says. “He ought to be fine though.”

“This is Sirius Black,” Fatima says loudly. “He’s Regulus’s older brother and Narcissa’s cousin. He’s the Black family’s heir.”

“Only until Mother and Father wise up and decide Regulus is the better option,” Sirius tells them.

The other first years glance between him and Regulus like they’re not quite sure what the proper response to that is. Narcissa takes pity on them. “He’s a Gryffindor and will be looking out for any of you that end up there.”

“I will?” Sirius asks.

“He will?” several of the first years echo. They sound equally dubious.

“They’re Muggle-born. Aunt Walburga will disapprove,” Narcissa wheedles.

“That’s Jeremiah Flint,” Sirius says doubtfully, gesturing at Jeremiah. The younger boy shifts under the scrutiny.

Narcissa rolls her eyes. “The ones you don’t recognize, Sirius.”

Sirius sighs but acquiesces. “James is going to be obnoxious about this.”

“He never struck me as a blood purist,” says Fatima, sounding far less interested in Sirius’s response than she actually is.

“Oh, he’s not. He’s got the biggest crush on Lily Evans though and he’s definitely going to try and use this to get into her good graces.”

Hecate takes a break from suspiciously eyeing the toad demon and looks up. “Think it’ll work? I’ve got money on her breaking his nose this year.”

“And I’ve got money on them going to Madam Puddifoot’s,” Arachne, by far the more romantic of the duo, adds.

Narcissa doesn’t quite manage to suppress a twitch at the mention of Madam Puddifoot’s, but she’s pretty sure only Sirius and Fatima notice. They’re both kind enough not to comment on it. Sirius gives them a palms-up gesture. “Well, she’s already broken Amos Diggory’s hand and we’ve only been on the train for an hour. Anything is possible. I suppose I ought to go make sure Moony isn’t having some sort of allergic reaction to the d—toad.” He flees.

Fatima shakes her head. “Remind me how your family controls our government? None of you could keep a secret if your lives depended on it.”

“Subtlety isn’t always efficient,” Narcissa says with a slow smile, thinking about Bellatrix’s cursed tattoo and Andromeda’s unborn child. They can certainly keep the secrets that matter. “We’re straight-forward. People like that.”

“Like a Killing Curse to the heart,” Hecate agrees.

Narcissa flicks her wand, willing the silencing charm back into existence. “We’ll save that as a last resort for Rabastan,” she says. “I’ll owl Bellatrix when we get to the castle. She’s better at this sort of thing than I am.”

Fatima openly shudders.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you enjoyed!


	8. the patron saint of lost causes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The rest of the Express ride and the Sorting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title from florence and the machine's "st. jude"

“Anything from the trolley, dears?” Maud, the witch who sells food from the trolley, asks.

The Muggle-born first years all exchange glances. “Skittles?” one asks hopefully. Narcissa thinks her name is Lisa.

Maud blinks. “What?”

“Licorice?” another wants to know.

Maud pulls out a licorice wand. The Muggle-borns stare. Narcissa takes pity on them and does a quick headcount. “Fourteen of everything,” she says. “And a pumpkin pasty for me. Do the rest of you want anything? You too, Snape. Snacks are on me today.”

“I don’t need your charity, Black,” he snaps.

“Well, you’ve got it. Either take advantage or don’t.”

“...I’ll have a cauldron cake.”

“Good,” Narcissa says, pleased with herself. She’s been trying to befriend Snape since he was a pale, lonely first year. It’s been rather like attempting to befriend a feral cat. She feeds him, he hisses at her. They go back to ignoring each other. “Girls, anything?”

Hecate and Arachne split a box of sugar quills and Fatima gets a box of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans, which she proceeds to eat by the handful without so much as a twitch. It’s horrible to watch, but Narcissa is unable to stop herself.

The rest of the train ride passes uneventfully. She enjoys watching the Muggle-borns try magical candy for the first time, and several of them—she’ll learn their names eventually—have smuggled Muggle candy aboard. They share it out between their pureblood peers, whose suspicion quickly turns to enthusiasm when they discover that Muggle candy has more refined sugar than they’re used to.

The rest of the train ride passes peacefully, or as peacefully as anything can pass when several hundred teenagers armed with potentially deadly weapons are loaded with sugar and left largely unsupervised. Before she knows it, Narcissa is off the Hogwarts Express and attempting to divest herself of her first years.

“Why do we have to take a boat?” Daniel, one of the Muggle-borns, wants to know.

“Who is he?” Elizabeth Keene demands, eyeing Hagrid with suspicion. “My parents told me never to go anywhere with a stranger.”

Narcissa is starting to get the feeling that Elizabeth Keene only listens to her parents when it suits her, which is whenever it's the least convenient for everyone else involved. “This is Mr. Hagrid,” she says patiently. “Keeper of the Keys and the Hogwarts groundskeeper.”

“‘Hello, Miss Black. How was your summer?” Hagrid asks, then bellows for the missing first years so they know where to find him. Everyone nearby winces at the volume, even Trevor.

“Well enough, Hagrid, and yours?”

Demonology is Narcissa’s main interest, but it isn’t exactly taught at Hogwarts. Care of Magical Creatures is, and Hagrid frequently helps Kettleburn with lessons that require more limbs than the older man is in possession of. He’s one of the kindest people she knows, although she’s careful not to let anyone know she thinks that.

The giant of a man beams behind his beard. “ I finally got the thestrals to trust me! You’ll have to come by after class sometime this week and meet them—oh,” he frowns, likely looking for a delicate way to ask whether she can see them.

“I’d be happy to come and see them,” she says, hoping he picks up on the nuance of what she’s saying.

He nods gravely, then calls for the first years again. Elizabeth Keene crosses her arms and looks mutinous, which Narcissa supposes is understandable. If one of the few people she knew in a completely foreign culture attempted to abandon her with a man she didn’t know and a collection of eleven-year-olds she wasn’t likely to be pleased either. It’s then that Hagrid catches sight of Trevor.

“Is that—” he begins and then pauses, clearly unsure he wants an answer.

“A cane toad,” Narcissa says. She tries and fails to look innocent.

Hagrid mutters something that sounds suspiciously like “and me mum was a fairy.”

“Hm?” Narcissa asks.

“What?” says Hagrid, pulling off false innocence much better than she ever could.

“Ugh,” is Elizabeth Keene’s disgusted verdict. She trails after Hagrid without further complaint after he does a headcount confirming the presence of all of the first years and begins shepherding them to the boats.

Narcissa leaves them to it and goes in search of one of the last carriages. Arachne and Hecate have gone on without her, which means she’s stuck waiting with the stragglers. One of them is Snape. He detaches himself from the shadows he’d been lurking in and nods a greeting that she returns with a raised eyebrow. He doesn’t say anything, but when the next carriage pulls up he helps her into it, albeit grudgingly and without any charm or flourishes.

“Are you going to burst into tears too, if I ask you how your summer was?” he finally mutters.

Narcissa pretends to think about it. “I suppose not.”  
They sit in silence for a moment until Snape sighs, aggrieved. “How was your summer?”

She thinks about everything she could say, ranging from Walburga’s increasing unhingedness to Bellatrix and Andromeda’s abrupt departure from the family, to her potential marriage to Lucius Malfoy. She settles on showing Trevor to Snape. “I made a new friend.”

“That’s a demon,” says Snape.

Narcissa tickles the toad demon under its chin. “I suppose it is, isn’t it?”

“Are you out of your mind?”

Snape’s conversational tone never changes, which is one of the things Narcissa likes about him. She smiles when Trevor leans into her hand. “Really, it’s a sweetheart. Would you like to hold it?”

“Would I like to—fine. Why not.”

She hands Trevor over while the carriage bumps toward to castle. Snape and the demon regard each other with suspicion. Cautiously, the demon stretches out its impossibly long tongue and sticks it in Snape’s ear. Narcissa retrieves it hurriedly after that. The demon spends the rest of the trip sitting on her lap and licking its lips, while Snape scrubs at his ear with the fraying sleeve of his robe.

They’re among the last students to slip into the Great Hall, practically on the heels of McGonagall and the first years. They must be a bright group this year; the alphabetizing process usually takes much longer.

“You might as well sit with us,” Narcissa says before Snape can flee to the far end of the Slytherin table to eat with the second years, all of whom are still too intimidated by the fact that he’s an older student to harass him about his blood status or financial situation. Both being poor and being a halfblood were undesirable traits. Combined, they were nearly unforgivable. Snape hesitates, clearly torn between not having to listen to twelve-year-olds talk and having to talk to Narcissa and her friends. His hesitation is all the opportunity she needs to loop her arm through his and begin dragging him toward the closer end of the table.

Arachne, Hecate, and Fatima are there, as are the older Slytherin boys. She gives Jupiter, Jeremiah Flint’s ambitiously named eldest brother, a semi-cordial nod and ignores the rest of them. Wilkes begins to bristle at the sight of Snape, but Narcissa smiles her emptiest, most meaningless smile when he opens his mouth and he subsides. She makes Snape sit between Fatima and Hecate anyway, just to be on the safe side.

“What have I missed?” she asks, making sure Trevor is comfortable in her lap.

Fatima doesn’t look up from studying her reflection in a spoon. “Nothing worthwhile.”

She eyes the nervous first years lined up between the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables. “Are we expecting anyone interesting this year?”

“Other than Regulus?” Hecate asks dryly.

“The Crouch boy, maybe,” says Fatima. “His mother was a Hufflepuff, but old Barty was a snake.”

“Jeremiah,” Jupiter adds.

“The Selwyn girl, Latona,” Narcissa speculates. “Not the latest Travers though. That one is headed for Hufflepuff.”

“You’re familiar?” asks a smirking Jupiter, and it occurs to her that his mother—Mr. Flint’s second wife—had been a Travers. He and Agravain Travers are likely cousins of some degree.

“I assisted your step-mother with school shopping. I was already taking Regulus, so taking the rest of the first years too wasn’t any trouble.”

“Did you really fight a werewolf?” Snape asks suddenly.

The table goes quiet as conversations pause and every person within earshot holds their breath while they wait for an answer.

“Sort of,” Narcissa allows. “Fenrir Greyback and Rabastan Lestrange,”—the insensitivity of bringing Rabastan up around Arachne only occurs to her after the words are already out of her mouth—“were part of the attack on Diagon Alley. I was in Slug and Jigger’s with the first years when Greyback cornered us.”

“There’s a trapdoor to a storeroom in the back, and it connects to tunnels,” Snape says, almost disapprovingly. “I would have thought that you would know about it.”

“A shelf had tipped over.”

“And the mixed ingredients were too volatile for you to use magic on anything near them,” Snape finishes for her. “Still, that was stupid.”

“Adorable that you were worried,” Jupiter tells him. “From what I hear though, Greyback is still in St. Mungo’s and they’re talking about moving him to a permanent room in Spell Damage. They’re worried his next transformation might kill him before he can stand trial.”

All eyes turn to Narcissa, who shrugs. “Transfiguration has never been my strong suit.”

The Sorting starts then, saving her from explaining herself any further. Phoebe Alton goes to Ravenclaw, then Maxen Belby joins Hufflepuff.

“Black, Regulus,” calls McGonagall, and Narcissa sits up straighter.

She watches Regulus’s thin form march determinedly up to the stool. He sits down, and McGonagall drops the hat on his head. Regulus screws his face up the way he does when he’s thinking hard about something, and Narcissa feels her heart start to sink. Seconds drag by, then turn to minutes. People begin to mutter.

“—shoo-in for sure.”

“—old family—”

“He has to be in—”

“GRYFFINDOR!” shouts the hat.

Regulus hands it back to a stunned McGonagall and bounces over to the Gryffindor table to join Sirius. Narcissa forces a smile onto her face when her cousins glance at her, their lips pulled into identical expressions of concern. It’s easy to see their similarities when they’re both wearing red ties, pale boys with ink-colored hair.

She doesn’t hear the rest of the ceremony, although thankfully Arachne is paying enough attention to wave newly-minted Slytherin Elizabeth Keene over to sit between her and Narcissa rather than throwing the girl straight to the wolves. Narcissa can’t stop thinking about Walburga’s reaction to the news. Her aunt isn’t cruel, at least no more than anyone else, but she does have a temper—a temper already frayed by Bellatrix and Andromeda’s respective familial betrayals. She’s sure to take Regulus’s Sorting as further proof she’s losing control of the next generation of Blacks and react accordingly. Even Uncle Orion can’t fail to notice his second son’s Sorting, although she’s sure he’ll try.

Narcissa eats mechanically, too busy mentally composing letters to her sisters to even taste her food.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope everyone's staying safe and doing well!


	9. hold a match up to your paper castle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter title from ellie goulding's hollow crown

After the Welcoming Feast is over, Narcissa takes charge of Elizabeth Keene and goes to find McGonagall, Trevor riding along on her shoulder. Leaving the fifth year prefects and Fatima to wrangle the younger years, she sets off. She makes it as far as the Entrance Hall before Sirius and Regulus catch up to her.

“Are you mad at me?” Regulus, always one for forthrightness, asks.

“Of course not,” Narcissa reassures him. “If you’re happy, I’m happy.”

“Mother is going to be unhappy,” he points out.

“Leave that old c—” Sirius begins, cut off by a pointed cough from Narcissa. “Cow. Leave that old cow to me,” he finishes.

“I’ll owl Bellatrix and Andromeda,” Narcissa agrees. “We’ll figure something out.”

“What are you going to do about this one?” Sirius asks, gesturing at Elizabeth Keene. “She’s Muggle-born, isn’t she?”

“She’s right here,” the tiny girl informs him.

“You’re friendly with Latona Selwyn and Jeremiah Flint, aren’t you?” Narcissa asks her.

Elizabeth Keene nods. “They were sorted into Slytherin too.”

Narcissa looks at Sirius and shrugs. “Her year mates won’t give her trouble, and I’ll make it clear no one else is to bother her.”

“Why would anyone bother me?”

“I’ll also give her a rundown of the current sociopolitical climate,” Narcissa says when Sirius raises an eyebrow. “You’ve got Regulus?”

“I’ve got Regulus,” he confirms.

“Great,” says Narcissa. “Good talk. I have to find McGonagall.”

“Give her my love!” Sirius calls as she hurries away, Elizabeth Keene in tow.

She talks while she walks, pointing out classrooms and people of note to the first year. “Here’s the Charms classroom to your left. Charms is taught by Professor Flitwick, Head of Ravenclaw. He’s not entirely human, so he’ll look a bit odd to you. It’s not very polite to bring up, so don’t mention it. Here’s a girls’ toilet, handy for if you’re coming from the dungeons—”

“Why would anyone bother me?” Elizabeth Keene asks again. “I haven’t done anything.”

Narcissa sighs. She’d been hoping for more time to formulate an answer to that question. “So, you know how your parents are Muggles?”

Elizabeth Keene makes a ‘no duh’ sort of face, but nods.

“The witch trials—I don’t know how much you know about them, but Muggles in the 16th and 17th centuries hunted and killed hundreds of witches and wizards. The magical world got together and passed the Statute of Secrecy, which meant that magic had to be kept secret from Muggles. They did it to protect the magical world from Muggle hysteria and religious zealotry. Does that make sense?”

“My parents are atheists,” says Elizabeth Keene. “And they don’t have a problem with me being a witch. They thought it was really cool when Professor McGonagall came to explain everything and turned our kitchen table into a cow.”

“Most Muggles do think magic is cool,” Narcissa agrees. “But some of them don’t, and they would hurt us if they knew about it. What I’m trying to say though is that since the witch trials, a lot of witches and wizards have been afraid of Muggles. Some witches and wizards think that Muggle-borns—whose parents have to be told about magic—are a security risk. They’re afraid, and that makes them angry. Some of them take it out on Muggle-borns.”

“That’s stupid,” Elizabeth Keene decides. “The witch trials were ages ago.”

“They were. People are still afraid though. Some of them think Muggle-borns shouldn’t be allowed in our society at all, but that’s dangerous too. If you don’t learn how to control your magic it will control you, and that’s an even bigger risk to the Statue than telling Muggle parents about magic.”

“Magic can control you?” the girl looks alarmed.

“It’s not something you have to worry about, not now that you’re at Hogwarts. Magic is...complicated. It’s energy. It has to go somewhere or do something. If you don’t use it, either because you’re afraid of it or you don’t know that you have it, there gets to be so much of it that it does whatever it wants, essentially, whether you want it to or not.”

“I’m not allowed to do magic at home though.”

“I know. That’s not great, but the odds of you getting hurt while trying a new spell or potion are much higher than the odds of three months of not using your magic harming you.”

Elizabeth Keene looks frustrated. “Why not have a grown-up witch or wizard to supervise Muggle-born students?”

“That’s another argument—that as soon as a Muggle-born child shows signs of magical potential, they should be taken from their parents and raised in the magical world. That’s...tricky from a moral perspective. It’s not something you’ll have to worry about unless you pay attention in your History of Magic classes—which you should, even though Binns is insufferably dry—but Article II of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, passed by the United Nations in 1948 defines genocide as a variety of acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, including forcibly transferring the children of the group to another group—actually, don’t worry about it. The point is, some people here won’t like you because of who your parents are. It’s nothing you can control. Work hard. Prove them wrong. Put up a fight, if it comes to that. And tell me if anyone bothers you. I’ll do my best to dissuade them.”

“Okay,” says Elizabeth Keene, brightening. “We’re going to see McGonagall, right? Do you think she’ll turn a table into a cow again if I ask?”

“You didn’t hear it from me, but she can actually turn herself into a cat. Ask her to show you sometime. She’s what’s called an Animagus.”

“Is that like being Muggle-born? Were her parents cats?”

“Ah, no. It means you can turn into one specific animal at will. It’s a skill you can learn.”

Elizabeth Keene is quiet for a moment before asking, “can you pick the animal?”

They arrive at the doorway to the Transfiguration classroom then, through which is another door and a set of stairs leading up to McGonagall’s office and, allegedly beyond that, her private quarters. Narcissa isn’t convinced that the Transfiguration professor ever rests, let alone sleeps, so the existence of her private quarters remains a rumor, not a fact.

McGonagall is in the classroom, waving her wand and watching desks fly around the room with a frown on her face. “Sadly not, Miss Keene, or I would have liked to be a dragon,” she says. The desks settle to the ground. “Please, come in. Would either of you like tea?”

“Yes, please, professor,” says Narcissa.

“I’m not supposed to have anything caffeinated after dinner,” Elizabeth Keene informs them apologetically. “My mum says it will keep me up and stunt my growth.”

“Your mother will be pleased to know that I have decaffeinated blends,” McGonagall says, and leads them into her office.

The room is cozy, dominated by a massive oaken desk and even larger bookshelves stuffed full of obscure Transfiguration tomes. An overstuffed chair upholstered with tartan fabric sits behind the desk, and two less comfortable but equally tartan chairs sit across from it. Narcissa settles into one of them, Elizabeth Keene into the other.

“You wished to see me, professor?”

“I did, Miss Black. Fifty points to Slytherin for courage and quick-thinking in a crisis. Another fifty for cursing Greyback.”

“It wasn’t technically a curse,” Narcissa feels obligated to say. “And you don’t have to do that.”

“Another ten for selflessness.”

“Really, I’d rather not have to explain this.”

“And take ten for humility.”

Narcissa gives up. “If you insist.”

“I do. I’m afraid I misjudged you, Miss Black. I looked at you and saw your sisters, but you’re your own person, and a fine one at that.”

“Now you’re just embarrassing me, professor. Sirius sends his love, by the way.”

McGonagall doesn’t manage to restrain herself from rolling her eyes, which delights Elizabeth Keene. “I’m sure he does, that hellion. I won’t keep you, Miss Black, but if you ever need anything—a letter of reference, advice, help of any sort—please let me know.”

“I will, professor, thank you.”

Narcissa drains her tea, followed by Elizabeth Keene. She leads the younger girl down to the dungeons, pointing out landmarks along the way. She shows her to the first year girls’ dorm, gives Latona Selwyn a pointed look, and goes to write to her sisters.

_~~Dear Andromeda—~~ _

_~~Bellatrix, Bella—~~ _

_~~Dear Andy—~~ _

_~~I don’t know how to say this.~~ _

_~~I have news.~~ _

_~~I am writing to inform you—~~ _

_~~Regulus is a Gryffindor.~~ _

_~~I’m scared of what Aunt Walburga might do. You remember what happened with Sirius—~~ _

_~~Why did you leave me? I needed you. I still need you.~~ _

_~~I don’t know what to do.~~ _

_My dearest sister,_

_Sirius, Regulus, and I have arrived safely at Hogwarts. Regulus is settling in well, although his sorting was a bit of a surprise. Our cousin, a Gryffindor! Imagine that. I’m uncertain how to break the news to our darling aunt—she can be rather temperamental, as I’m sure you’re aware._

_Nothing else of note has happened yet. There’s another new Defense professor this year, which won’t shock you. I’ve never heard of him, though perhaps you have. Antonin Dolohov? He has an accent, Eastern European or Russian. Supposedly he’s a bounty hunter of some renown._

_Fatima Shafiq is the only returning Slytherin seventh year. She’s always been rather cool, but we get along well enough. Arachne Greengrass shared some upsetting news on the Express ride here. For some unfathomable reason, her father has seen fit to betroth her to Rabastan Lestrange, as her engagement with Corban Yaxley fell through._

_Any advice you have on Regulus or Arachne’s situations would be appreciated. I hope you’re staying safe, wherever you are._

_Fondly,_

_Narcissa_

Curfew has come and gone by the time Narcissa finishes writing out a copy of the letter for each of her sisters. Her candle has burned down to half its former height, the marks on it indicating that she’s been sitting at her desk for at least three hours. She’s alone in the common room save for Jupiter and Fatima. The former is asleep on a couch near what’s left of the fire, the later reading a thick, dusty book by the steady, white light of a Lumos charm. Narcissa folds and addresses the letters. It’s far too late to take them to the Owlery. Trevor opens one golden eye when she sighs. He—demons are usually genderless, but referring to him as ‘it’ when she spends every waking moment in his presence feels odd—crawls up her arm and perches on her shoulder.

“Time for bed?” she asks quietly.

He sticks his tongue in her ear, which she takes as a yes. Narcissa gathers her things, blows out her candle, and makes her way toward Jupiter’s couch. She kicks it lightly. “Flint. Jupiter.”

The boy grunts and opens one sleepy eye, not unlike Trevor had moments earlier. “Black? What is it?”

“Something wrong with your dorm? Your neck is going to hurt if you sleep down here.”

He looks around. “Huh. Didn’t mean to fall asleep. Thanks, Black.”

Narcissa leaves him to rub the sleep from his eyes and makes her way to her own dorm. Arachne and Hecate are already asleep, their breathing echoing reassuringly through the room. She changes into her pajamas, makes sure Trevor is comfortable, and proceeds to stare at the canopy of her bed for an hour before finally falling asleep.


	10. i just wanted you to know (this is me trying)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ready for everything I write to be vaguely inspired by taylor swift's new album? title from "this is me trying"
> 
> i've also gone through and made some edits to the past chapters--nothing major, mostly just ??? what was I trying to say here? where and why are the commas? stuff. nothing that's going to make a difference plot-wise.

To make up for abandoning her Prefect duties the night before, Narcissa escorts the Slytherin first years to breakfast. She dresses, tucks Trevor and the letters for her sisters into her book bag, and makes her way downstairs to meet them. There are five of them that she doesn’t recognize, along with Latona, Jeremiah, and Elizabeth. She makes them line up in the common room before they head out, teaching them spells to get rid of wrinkles in their clothes and scuffs on their shoes. 

“Magic is so cool,” Elizabeth breathes. 

“These are just boring domestic charms,” sniffs a boy Narcissa thinks might be an Ogden. He shoots a look at Narcissa, clearly preparing to test either her patience or her temper. “Work for women or servants.”

“Unfortunately, not every piece of magic you perform will be a great work,” Narcissa says agreeably. She has spent the last three months listening to Walburga snipe at her. The boy is going to have to work a lot harder than this. “Almost as unfortunate as the airs that merchant-class families feel obligated to put on. Ogden, isn’t it?” she asks.

The boy flinches as if she had slapped him. “Yes,” he tells her cautiously.

“Let me be very clear with you, Ogden. And the rest of you, as well. I don’t care what your families say. Here in Slytherin, in _my house_ , you will learn to stand on your own two feet. You will learn independence, self-sufficiency. _Manners._ A man who is too helpless to dress without the aid of women or servants is no man at all.”

Narcissa meets each of their gazes. Technically, it should be Fatima here, setting precedents and making decisions. She’s the eldest girl in Slytherin, high-born, and she would be a Prefect if only by dint of being the only female seventh year left unmarried if Slughorn could convince her to take up the mantle. Fortunately for Narcissa, Fatima lacks interest in anything that isn’t a book. Arachne and Hecate tend to defer to Narcissa too, either because of her last name or the force of her personality. That means _she_ runs Slytherin this year—her kingdom come and her will be done. Anyone who takes issue with her decisions is welcome to duel her, although the fact that both Bellatrix and Andromeda had occupied this position before her make that unlikely.

None of the older boys, all of whom remember quite clearly that the eldest Black sister’s two great passions even as a teenager were feminism and the Dark Arts, would give her any trouble.

“Are we clear?” Narcissa asks.

It’s rather like how she imagines running a large household might be, she muses. If convincing one’s husband to adopt one’s political agenda was as simple as terrorizing eleven-year-olds. The first years all nod. Narcissa eyes Ogden. “Hey,” she says. “I’m not angry with you. Are you angry with me?”

He looks startled to have been singled out again. “No,” he says when he finds his words. “My father—he says things like that and my mother never complains. I never thought about it the way you said though. He has to go to my mother whenever he needs anything done, even just a button reattached. It’s demeaning, isn’t it? For her to have so much control over him?”

Not quite what Narcissa had been aiming for, but an improvement. “Let’s get breakfast,” she says. “If anyone else has anything else they would like to say on the matter, they’re welcome to approach me privately.”

She shoos the first years to the far end of the table when they reach the Great Hall, leaving them with a stern warning that she’ll know if all they eat are pastries and to at least have some fruit—and no, pumpkin juice didn’t count. She also informs them that Slughorn will be by with their schedules, and to come find her when they’re done eating because she’ll take them to their first class. “Remember what I said,” she tells Elizabeth in a low voice after the others have gone. “Any trouble, you tell me.”

The girl nods, and then she follows her year-mates. Narcissa is left to her own devices for the time being. Hecate and Arachne aren’t up yet, and Fatima has likely already eaten and left for the library. She pushes a pile of scrambled eggs around her plate while studying the Gryffindor table. Sirius and his friends are there, sitting next to the first years while Lily Evans eyes them suspiciously. Potter keeps glancing furtively at her, which she absolutely notices given the way her eyes narrow further. Regulus spots her looking and waves, which results in the other first years waving too. Narcissa smiles and waves back at them. 

She slips bacon to Trevor. He’s going to get fat at this rate, especially without Kreacher here to chase him around. “Who’s a love?” she coos at him. “Not you. My unholy boy.”

He scrunches in her lap, eyes happily squinted. 

“Ah, Miss Black!” someone exclaims.

She turns, seeing Slughorn’s purple, velvet-clad belly before she sees the rest of him. “Hello, professor,” she says. “How was your summer?”

“Excellent, excellent. Every vacation is. Now tell me, is it true what they’re saying about your sisters? I don’t mean to pry, but it’s just so unbelievable…”

“What are they saying?” Narcissa asks, genuinely curious. “They were both disowned, that much is true.”

Slughorn nods thoughtfully. “Well, I’m sorry to hear that. They were both very promising young ladies. I suppose congratulations are in order—your dowry must be vastly improved.”

Thankfully, Narcissa has plenty of practice smiling at people she’d like to slap. “Yes, sir. It has.”

“A Wizengamot seat, if I’m not mistaken?”

“A two percent share of the votes upon my father’s death,” Narcissa confirms. Sirius, of course, will be inheriting a ten percent voting share in the Wizengamot—the maximum allowed for any individual—whenever Uncle Orion deigns to die or Aunt Walburga gets fed up and kills him. 

“Interesting, interesting. Has your uncle found a suitable young man for you yet?”

Narcissa doesn’t particularly like this line of questioning. Slughorn might simply be nosy, but he might also be inquiring for himself. That’s a fate she would rather avoid. She says, “I believe my father is in negotiations with Abraxas Malfoy.”

“Malfoy? Yes, I think I remember him from school. I thought Abraxas’s wife was still alive?”

Narcissa shrugs delicately. “I believe she is. He has a son several years out of school though. A Durmstrang graduate.”

Slughorn nods to himself. “Yes, yes, I see. Old family, good bloodline for all that they’re French. Fallen on some hard times recently.”

“Nothing marrying the sole daughter of the House of Black wouldn’t fix,” Narcissa tells him lightly. 

Her comment has the intended effect; Slughorn lets out a booming laugh that has heads turning their way. “Right you are, my dear! Now, I came over here for a reason, not just to gossip...your schedule! Here you are. I trust you have the first years well in hand?”

“And the rest of the house,” Narcissa promises.

“Very glad to hear it, very glad. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I had better hand out the rest of the schedules.”

Narcissa watches him go with relief. That was a conversation she would be happy never to repeat. Snape plops into the seat next to hers. “Was he hitting on you?” he demands, disgusted. “Is that what that was?”

Jupiter Flint appears too. Where they’d been ten minutes ago when she could have used them as a distraction, she doesn’t know. “Was that true about you and Malfoy, or just something to give ol’ Sluggy the slip?”

“I sincerely hope he’s just nosy,” Narcissa tells Snape. To Jupiter, she says, “it’s true, as far as I know. That was before my sisters were disowned, but I doubt my uncle wants the votes going to an existing power that might manage to oppose him someday. It would be far better to marry me to someone without a seat, then have one of my children marry one of Sirius’s to bring the votes back into the family.”

“Shame,” Jupiter says, and winks. “I’m single.”

Narcissa studies him. “If you wanted to be helpful…”

“Why does this sound like I’m going to hate it?” Jupiter sighs, although he doesn’t seem terribly upset. He’s single, yes, but he’s also bored. 

“Relax,” she says. “It won’t be so bad. Ask your father about Arachne Greengrass.”

“Isn’t she betrothed to Corban Yaxley?” Jupiter wants to know.

Narcissa shakes her head. “Fell through, and now her father is leaning toward Rabastan Lestrange.”

The face Jupiter makes tells her that he knows what that means. “I’ll ask,” he promises. “If Lestrange resists the idea my father will fold like a house of cards though.”

“I’m not usually glad not to be a pureblood,” Snape says, typical anti-social nature overcome by morbid curiosity, “but I’m reconsidering that stance.”

“Just ask,” Narcissa says to Jupiter. “If nothing else, it might buy her some time.”

She goes back to ignoring them in favor of studying her class schedule, although she does take Trevor out so Snape can feed him bits of sausage. Snape, like Bellatrix, is fascinated by the dusty, obscure corners of the Dark Arts. He prefers potions to curses, but there are enough similarities between them to make Narcissa fond of him. She’s also confident that, despite Trevor’s insistence on attempting to consume his earwax, he’s interested in the demon.

Save for Transfiguration, which she hadn’t qualified for, Narcissa is continuing all of her classes. Eight NEWT classes is a not inconsiderable amount, particularly on top of Prefect duties and the interpersonal drama that comes with being a sixteen-year-old. She frowns down at her schedule. It appears more complicated than it needs to be, full of numbers, letters, and colors...because Slughorn slipped her a master copy. Nice of him, but not enough to make her any less nervous about his what intentions he might be harboring toward her. She flips the paper over. Her own schedule is on the back.

She doesn’t have any classes on Friday which ought to be relaxing, but she has Defense, Charms, and History of Magic all on Wednesday to make up for it. That’s going to be a long day, and will likely result in her skipping the club meeting for magical theory that night more often than not. Perhaps she’ll only show up when the guest speaker of the week promises to be exceptionally interesting. Today is Tuesday, so all she has is Ancient Runes in the afternoon. She flips back to the master schedule and checks to see where she’ll be shepherding the first years. She runs her finger down the list of Tuesday classes, discovering that they have Transfiguration first thing this morning. 

Transfiguration tops the list of best classes to have on one’s very first day at Hogwarts, so Narcissa is glad. McGonagall, for all that she had hated her class, will assuage any fears the first years might be harboring. Unluckily, they have History of Magic that afternoon. Not even the novelty of being taught by a ghost is likely to overcome Binns’s sleep-inducing drone for long. The only reason Narcissa had passed the History OWL was because there weren’t any books strictly on demonology in the library; she was forced to pick through various history and theory tomes to find anything worthwhile. She’d continued it at a NEWT level so she would have a designated study and/or nap period. She debates warning the first years that History of Magic was likely to be unbearable but decides she doesn’t want to unduly influence their opinion of the class any more than their older siblings already have. 

Speaking of the first years, they’re starting to shoot furtive glances in her direction, and she can see their schedules scattered in front of their breakfast dishes. There’s still almost forty-five minutes before morning classes start, but that won’t deter them for long. She sighs to herself, stuffs an entire cherry turnover in her mouth, and washes it down with a cup strong of tea.

Snape and Jupiter both watch her with bemusement. “What happened to your ‘if you don’t eat healthily I’ll know about it’ spiel for the first years?” Jupiter wants to know. “Nice job with the Ogden boy, by the way. You’re much less frightening than Bellatrix was. Andromeda too, for that matter.”

Snape, who had been in his first year when Bellatrix was in her seventh, doesn’t quite manage to suppress a shudder. 

Narcissa ignores them, getting up and heading toward the first years. “Hi, Miss Black!” Elizabeth greets her brightly. “Transfiguration is what Professor McGonagall does, isn’t it? She’s so cool,” she directs this part to her year mates. “My parents didn’t believe magic was real and thought she was playing a prank on them, so she turned their table into a cow to prove it. A real, live cow!” 

“Plants and animals transfigured from inanimate objects lack souls, so whether they can be considered ‘real’ or ‘live’ is a matter of some debate,” Narcissa says, which makes all of the first years blink at her.

“I thought you were bad at Transfiguration?” Jeremiah wants to know. 

“Just the practical parts. The theory isn’t so bad. Now, I need to run to the Owlery before class. You can either come with me and see it, or I can come back for you and then show you to Transfiguration. Thoughts?”

The first years look at each other and shrug. It’s Ogden who pipes up with, “let’s go see the Owlery then.”

Feeling rather like she’s being followed by ducklings instead of children, she leads them out of the Great Hall. “Unfortunately,” she tells them, “Hogwarts is rather large. It was designed to be deliberately confusing to potential invaders as well, so portraits, staircases, rooms, and occasionally entire towers move. If you’re interested, the library has several copies of _Hogwarts, A History_ , the most recent version of which is by Bathilda Bagshot.”

“Where’s the library?” asks Barty.

“An excellent question, and one I will answer for you after your history class this afternoon. I’ll show you the way then.”

“What classes do you have today?” one of the first years she doesn’t know asks. 

“Just Ancient Runes. It’s an elective that won’t be offered until your third year,” Narcissa explains for Elizabeth’s benefit. “It’s taught by Professor Blishen, although he’s been threatening to quit in order to work on a better textbook for years, so I’m not sure how much longer he’ll be around. It’s one of the more useful electives, in my opinion.”

Elizabeth looks skeptical. “How useful can _ancient_ runes possibly be?”

Narcissa’s explanation takes them the rest of the way to the Owlery and covers everything from tactile magic—magic that operates through runes drawn, painted, or embroidered onto various surfaces—to ward-building and ritual magic. She shows the first years how to call down an available school owl if they don’t have one of their own, then sends the letters she’d written last night to Bellatrix and Andromeda.

She puts a few knuts into the owl treat dispenser just outside the Owlery and lets the first years feed the owls until it’s time for them to go to class, reasoning that it will be good for them to get used to handling the birds. She leaves them with McGonagall, who has the nerve to smile and wish her a good morning, before hurrying off to the library. She hadn’t been kidding about teaching herself new tailoring spells, and Trevor will enjoy it there.


	11. way up high (beyond your gravity)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello! I return with a chapter. apologies for my attempt at old-timey writing. it's been several--bordering on a lot--of years since I last had to read anything from before the 1600s, and all of my reference materials are resting comfortably in my parents' basement. so, behold the results of a few google searches. 
> 
> chapter title is from weightless by liz longley

For all that she’ll never admit it, Narcissa loves the Hogwarts Library. She’s sure that part of it is merely because Walburga isn’t leaning over her shoulder while she reads, but the rest is all Hogwarts. The warm lighting, the cozy chairs, silence that’s comfortable rather than oppressive—it’s easy to spend hours here, lost in some obscure subject or other. Currently, that’s 18th-century tailoring charms. Magical fashion had undergone a rather radical transformation after the passage of the Statute of Secrecy, as had the magic used for spinning, sewing, and tailoring. Absentmindedly, she strokes Trevor’s head while she reads. 

_Whyle a Lady maye use her Wand alone, yt ys the opynion of thys Author that the best results are acheeved when dyrectyng a mundane Needle and Thread with one’s Wand, rather than Conjuracyon yn addycyon to weaving one’s owne Magyck..._

Narcissa blinks, then rereads the passage. The downside of using source material for her research into tailoring spells was that the Anglo-Saxon roots of the English were much more apparent, complicated by the Norman Conquest and an unhealthy linguistic and philosophical obsession with the ancient Greeks and Romans. Sirius insists that the Muggles have standardized English and she supposes he would know, given that Lupin is a halfblood and he hangs off the werewolf’s every word, but it’s hard to believe. She stares at the page. Why had ‘thys Author’ felt the need to treat vowels like that? 

She tries some of the spells before she has to leave to fetch the first years. The results are...decidedly mixed. The whitening spell does wonders for her blouse, which had adopted the uniform gray tinge common to anything Kreacher launders. The spell for fixing threadbare sweaters—there hadn’t been one specifically for runs in tights—reacts poorly with nylon. Both she and her chair end up lightly singed. She leaves before the smell of smoke can draw the ire of Madam Pince. The librarian is new as of last year, but she’s already made quite an impression. 

It’s nice to wander halls that aren’t full of taxidermied magical creatures, she reflects. The lack of house elf heads is particularly relieving. Magic tends to amplify emotions until they’re imbued into a location. It’s why the Great Hall is bright and cheerful, why just being in the Slytherin common room is enough to set one’s teeth on edge, and why Grimmauld Place, with its long, bloody history, makes visitors nauseous. Trevor, from his perch on her shoulder, growls when a portrait leers too obviously at her. 

“Shh,” Narcissa soothes. “I think that’s one of my many-times-great uncles.”

Trevor continues to rumble threateningly, so she hurries onward. She arrives at the door to the Transfiguration classroom just as morning classes are dismissed. She’s immediately swamped by first years babbling about matches, needles, and how McGonagall is _so cool_ , they can’t believe she’s not taking her class. Regulus is there too—the Houses all have classes together—and he bounces around her, a bright spot of red among a sea of green. 

“The Gryffindor Prefects say learning our own way around the castle is character building,” he says, disgusted. “Can you show us the way back to the Great Hall?”

“Isn’t Sirius supposed to be looking after you?” Narcissa asks.

“He’s in lunch detention.”

“Already?” Narcissa consults her schedule. “He had Herbology. What did he do to Sprout?”

“Nothing,” McGonagall says, emerging from her classroom to see what the fuss is about. Nine eleven-year-olds can generate quite the commotion. “He actually behaves for Pomona, though Merlin knows why. She won’t tell me her secret. He put Cassian Macmillan in the Hospital Wing right after breakfast though.”

Narcissa pinches the bridge of her nose. “Do I want to know why?”

“Probably not,” McGonagall tells her, sounding almost sympathetic. 

Narcissa looks at Regulus who says, “Macmillan called Andromeda ‘a jumped-up slut who’s no better than she ought to be.’ Then Sirius punched him.”

“That’s not so bad,” Narcissa says. “Macmillan is a seventh year. If he can’t handle a fourth year, that’s on him.”

“And then Sirius hit him with a pumpkin juice pitcher. And said some things about Macmillan’s mother. I think all of that was true, but Macmillan was mad anyway.”

“Thank you, Mr. Black,” McGonagall sighs. To Narcissa, she says, “that’s why. Flitwick is supervising his detention.”

“Thanks, professor. Sorry for the trouble.”

“Take this group to lunch before they starve.”

“Yes, professor.”

Narcissa ushers the first years down the hall, around the corner, and finds the rest of their peers huddled on a landing, staring mistrustfully at the staircase. There’s a Hufflepuff—Agravain Travers, of course—up to his waist in a trick stair. 

“Do all of your Prefects think getting lost builds character?” she asks. 

“Miss Black!” Agravain says. “I’m stuck.”

“I can see that,” Narcissa mutters, and levitates him out of the stair. “Every nineteenth step on this staircase starting with the third from the top is a trick stair, but only on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Come on, I’ll walk down with you. Keep count.” 

“Why every nineteenth?” Elizabeth wants to know as they walk.

“I guess because it’s an unexpected number. Not something you’d guess off the top of your head, is it? I’ve never thought about it. It’s a prime number, so it’s stable—no factors. That could be it. I don’t know much about magical engineering.”

“There are magical engineers?”

“Sure, although it’s more of a subset of cursebreaking at this point. Most old family homes are more magical than they are material at this point, so being able to untangle anything that goes wrong can be profitable.” Narcissa thinks about the magic tenuously holding Grimmauld Place together. “Dangerous though.”

Elizabeth considers this the rest of the way to the Great Hall while the rest of the first years discuss the Transfiguration class. Narcissa leaves them to it. Once they’re safely at their respective tables, she wraps a few sandwiches and cookies in a napkin, then heads for the Charms classroom.

Flitwick is at his desk, feet up and eyes closed. Sirius is slouching over a roll of paper writing...Narcissa squints. “I will not let my temper get the best of me?”

Sirius looks up at her. “Hey, what’re you doing here?” he asks softly.

“Brought you lunch. Is your hand broken?”

Sirius offers his bruised hand for her inspection. “Might be. It’s making writing lines a bit—pain.”

“A pain,” Narcissa repeats. “You should go to Pomfrey for this.”

“Can’t you do it?”

Narcissa snorts, she but subsides quickly when Flitwick shifts. “I’m not that good at healing.”

“You did alright on my nose last time I broke it,” he points out, trying to unwrap a sandwich one-handed.

“Only because you think having it crooked makes you look ruggedly handsome. Here, give me that.” She unwraps the sandwich, then takes his quill and starts to write the lines. 

“You don’t have to—when did you learn to forge my handwriting? That looks more like my handwriting that my handwriting does.”

“Like we can’t all forge your father’s?”

“Well, yes,” says Sirius. “I’m not sure if this is a compliment because you think I’ll take over as the head of the family, or an insult because you think I’ll be as useless as Father is.”

_I will not let me temper get the best of me._

“Up to you,” Narcissa tells him. “How many of these do you have to do? Does Flitwick know your hand is broken?”

“Your hand is what?” Flitwick asks suddenly, evidently not as asleep as Narcissa had assumed.

“Ah, professor,” Sirius says. “Didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“I wasn’t asleep,” Flitwick says with a surprising amount of dignity for a man Narcissa is fairly certain had been snoring softly. “Let’s see your hand. Did you go to class like this? Why didn’t you say anything?”

Sirius offers his hand to the tiny professor, stuffing the rest of his sandwich in his mouth as he does so. “Here,” he says around a mouthful of bread.

“You can pause to chew,” Flitwick informs him, prodding his hand with his wand. “No one is going to take it from you. What are you doing here, Miss Black? In detention too, or just visiting?”

“Just visiting. I haven’t had a class yet. The day is still young though.”

“Minerva has decided you walk on water for some reason, so I very much doubt you’ll end up in detention,” Flitwick mutters, adding several diagnostic spells under his breath. “How hard did you hit Mr. Macmillan, Mr. Black? Madam Meadowsweet said he had a concussion and your hand is broken in at least three places.”

“The concussion is probably from the pitcher of pumpkin juice Sirius hit him with when punching him didn’t get his point across,” Narcissa says. “The broken bones are from curling his fingers like an idiot.”

Sirius glares balefully at her. “How did you hear about the pitcher? Wait, don’t answer that. Did you have to bribe Regulus, or did he just tell you?”

“Told me,” Narcissa informs him smugly. “No prompting necessary.”

“That little snitch.”

“Maybe the Hat was right after all.”

Casting aspersions on Gryffindor’s collective character never fails to distract Sirius when he’s in a mood about something else. This time proves no different. He swells up, full of righteous indignation. 

“I’m going to stop you both right there,” says Flitwick. “Miss Black, if you would escort Mr. Black to the Hospital Wing. Please make sure he gets there and _do not_ try to heal his hand yourself. I will pretend I didn’t hear that you’ve been practicing healing without so much as a certificate.”

“It’s a civil offense, not a criminal one,” Narcissa tells him placidly. Most of the offenses she commits are, although Greyback had been borderline. “That’s very kind of you though, professor. Come on, Sirius. I’ve got Ancient Runes this afternoon and I need to take the first years to History when they’re done with lunch.”

“Oh, alright,” he pauses and sniffs. “Why do you smell like smoke? Have you been dueling?”

“Of course not. Who’s going to try to duel me?”

“And it’s against school rules,” Flitwick reminds them, although he sounds begrudgingly amused. 

“That too,” Narcissa agrees as she heads for the door.

Sirius trails after her. “See you later, professor.”

“Hopefully in class, not detention,” Flitwick says. “Please make an attempt to stay out of trouble, you two.”

“Of course, professor,” they chorus.

True to her word, Narcissa leaves Sirius and the remaining food she’d swiped with an absolutely thunderous Madam Meadowsweet. 

“This happened this morning _at breakfast_?” Narcissa can hear her demand as she hurries for the door. “And you’re only coming to see me _now_?”

“Well,” Sirius begins, but then Narcissa is out of earshot. 

Lunch is served for an hour and a half, so she still has plenty of time to return to the Slytherin dorm, grab her book bag, and return to the Great Hall for her own lunch. 

“Black, thank Merlin you’re here,” Jupiter says as soon as she sits. “This damned owl is for you and it won’t leave.”

Narcissa perks up. Could Bellatrix have written her back already? Her eldest sister’s owl hates everyone except for Bellatrix, and even then it only tolerates her when she has food. From Jupiter’s complaints, it sounds like it could be hers. The owl that stalked around his plate toward her was a barn owl though, not a great-horned one. She frowns at it. “And who are you?” she asks.

“A pain in the ass,” Jupiter mutters. 

She ignores him. The owl offers her the scroll attached to its leg. Narcissa takes it, watching as it visibly restrains itself from biting her. A glance at Jupiter’s hands reveals that he hadn’t been so lucky. 

_Dear Narcissa,_

_Your father told my father to tell me to write you once you were at school, since your aunt has probably been censoring your mail at home. Your father doesn’t seem to like her much, does he? Anyway, I’m sorry about the mail. And maybe your aunt, depending on how much you like her. She sounds incredibly irritating. It’s Lucius, by the way. Malfoy. I know nothing is official yet, and that it might never be, but I thought I’d write since we didn’t get to see each other again after that trip to Diagon/Knockturn and we might be married someday? To be honest with you, I didn’t ever expect to end up in an arranged marriage, not a proper one at least._

_I was sorry to hear about your sisters. Andromeda seemed nice, and I think Bellatrix was warming up to me? It was hard to tell with her. I’m also sorry if bringing them up was insensitive. I’ve never been accused of having much tact._

_Anyway, I’ve been well and I hope you have been too. I haven’t been doing anything terribly interesting—working at a hippogriff rescue in Wales, mostly. It’s not glamorous. I spend_ a lot _of time cleaning cages and building faux aeries that the ungrateful beasts ignore in favor of shipping crates, lightning-struck trees, depressions in rocks—I’m getting off topic. They’re lovely animals and I do enjoy my job, for all that I complain. If you'd like to see me (and feel free to say no!) I can volunteer to be the handler that brings in hippogriffs for that section of the Hogwarts Care of Magical Creatures curriculum. I believe that lesson is for the fourth years and not for at least a month, but we could still get lunch? Let me know._

_How are your classes? Tell Sirius and Regulus hello from me._

_Sincerely,  
Lucius Malfoy_

_P.S. Apologies for the owl as well. Her name is Lamp and she has terrible manners._

“You’re kind of unnerving when you smile,” Jupiter tells her. “Good news?”

“It’s from Lucius Malfoy. The owl’s name is Lamp and he apologizes for her behavior.”

“Ah,” Jupiter says. “Your beau. Was it a love letter? Does Malfoy write you poetry? That would be so romantic.”

“You sound like Arachne, Flint.”

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” Jupiter asks grandly.

Snape, who had been approaching, pauses. “I’d rather you didn’t.”

Jupiter laughs so hard that the swig of pumpkin juice he’d just taken comes out his nose. “Snape! No one told me you were funny.”

“He has his moments,” Narcissa agrees. “Sit down and eat, Snape. Have you been in the library this entire time? Were Hecate and Arachne there? I haven’t seen them all day.”

Snape shrugs. “They were at breakfast, but I haven’t seen this.”

“Don’t look at me,” says Jupiter. “I went back to bed after breakfast. I got up half an hour ago, and that’s only because I have Potions this afternoon.”

“They had Arithmancy this morning,” Narcissa says. “And I’ve got Ancient Runes this afternoon. I’ll try and catch them at dinner.”

“I can watch the first years sometimes if you’d like,” Jupiter offers. “I mean, I hope you never take me up on that. But if you need me to, I will. Snape can help.”

“I would rather not,” says Snape. “I will, however, take care of Trevor if you’d like.”

“I knew you liked him,” Narcissa says triumphantly. She does not point out that the demon has stolen all of the meat off of Snape's sandwich while he wasn't looking. “And don’t worry, Flint. I don’t mind the first years. It’s nice to feel like I’m helping them.”

“You are helping them,” Jupiter tells her. “Jeremiah says Agravain Travers would still be stuck in that step if you hadn’t gotten him out.”

Narcissa had meant something more along the lines of shaping young minds or whatever it was that inspired the professors to continue putting up with them, but that worked too. "Don't be ridiculous," she says instead of arguing. "They were right outside the Transfiguration classroom. McGonagall would have heard him yelling eventually."


	12. he thinks the slightest breeze could blow me over

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> rating changed because Hecate says fuck and will do so again before this fic is over. also Dolohov is a huge creep/threatening, but nothing bad happens (or will happen) to Narcissa. chapter title is from "fight like a girl" by kalie shorr
> 
> also hello! i keep deleting and redoing my plot outline. apologies for that

Narcissa settles into a desk in the front row. Arachne settles into the desk to her left, auburn hair pulled back into a braid that highlights her high cheekbones. Hecate sits next to Arachne so she’s bracketed securely between them like maybe this will protect her from her looming fate.

Class doesn’t start for a few more minutes, which gives Narcissa a chance to observe the new Defense professor. Antonin Dolohov would be painfully handsome, almost angelic even, if not for the jagged scar stretching from his right ear to the corner of his mouth. His hair is honey blond and his shoulders are broad, emphasized by the Muggle dress shirt he’s wearing. The sleeves are rolled up, which Narcissa thinks is a good look. Given the way Hecate and Arachne are eyeing him, they agree.

Dolohov is at his desk, apparently absorbed in a stack of papers and oblivious to the scrutiny Hogwarts’ sixth year Defense class is subjecting him to. Absently, he runs a hand through his hair. Narcissa accidentally shatters her inkwell. She might have been embarrassed, but she’s too busy staring at the tattoo on the inside of Dolohov’s left forearm to even feel the glass shards in her hand, let alone the stares of her classmates. 

He has the same tattoo as Bellatrix. The snake, the skull, the runes—it’s identical, only Dolohov hasn’t been scratching at his. 

“Are you okay? Merlin, Narcissa, you’re bleeding,” Arachne’s voice drags her out of her thoughts. 

Narcissa looks at her hand in dull surprise, which is, of course, when it starts to hurt. Between the ink and the blood, the scroll she had laid out on her desk for notes is a lost cause. “ _Evanesco_ ,” she says, which works for the most part even though she’s casting with her non-dominant hand. “ _Accio_ glass from my hand. _Evanesco. Episkey._ All good,” she tells Arachne, smiling tightly. 

Arachne looks like she wants to argue, and even Hecate is frowning at her, but Narcissa is saved by Dolohov standing up. 

“Is this everyone?” he asks, but he doesn’t wait for a response. “Excellent. My name is Antonin Dolohov, and I will be your new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor. I graduated with honors from Durmstrang ten years ago, and have since held a variety of jobs. Most recently, I have been acting as a bounty hunter for the British Ministry of Magic, tracing fugitives who thought they could flee justice at the hands of our illustrious government. Does anyone have any questions about my background or qualifications?”

It’s an interesting opening speech. His clear disdain for the Ministry has even the sleepiest, least-invested of the sixth years listening, but almost everyone is eyeing him like an Erumpent horn. Given the history of the Hogwarts Defense position, it wouldn’t be surprising if he self-destructed. The only question was whether he would take anyone with him. 

Dolohov appears unbothered. “In that case, can anyone tell me why you’re here? Yes?”

“To get a NEWT in Defense,” says a Ravenclaw named Ashbourne. 

“Partially correct. No, don’t tell me your name. I don’t care. What about you?”

McLaggen, the Gryffindor he called on, hadn’t been raising his hand. He sighs dramatically. “My mother is making me.”

“Completely incorrect. Anyone else?”

Narcissa raises her hand and smiles her prettiest, emptiest smile while she waits for him to call on her. 

“Miss Black?” 

“Well, we live in dangerous times, don’t we? It’s important we learn how to defend ourselves.”

“What makes you say that?” Dolohov asks. “Britain has known thirty years of peace, and even the war with Grindelwald was fought on soil other than our own. And it isn’t as if anyone would be foolish enough to attack the only daughter of the House of Black.” His smile is mocking, or maybe it’s just the way the scar on his cheek pulls taught when his facial muscles move. 

Very deliberately, Narcissa flicks her eyes to his left forearm, then back to his face. 

“Ah,” says Dolohov. “Yes, I remember now. You were present during the unfortunate attack on Diagon Alley this summer, weren’t you? I seem to recall you...damaged Greyback rather severely. Of course, he escaped Ministry custody last night. Had you heard? I would be very careful if I were you. There’s nothing Greyback loves more than pretty girls and revenge.”

Narcissa says nothing, but raises her chin defiantly and refuses to look away as he stares at her. Finally, he looks away. “Miss Black isn’t correct either, although if you are ever unlucky enough to find yourself in a dangerous situation, knowing how to defend yourself may save your life. No, you’re here to hone your control over your magic. Outside of this classroom, you may never use any of these spells again. Now, take out a piece of parchment and make me a list of everything you know about silent spellcasting. Individually, please. No talking.”

The rest of the lesson isn’t terrible, for all that Dolohov is one of Voldemort’s thugs and a creep besides. After successfully silently disarming both Hecate and Arachne, her friends take turns trying to disarm her while she stands and blinks at them placidly. Frustrated, Hecate hisses, “ _Expelliarmus_ ,” which works, but earns her a lecture on shortcuts from Dolohov. 

When he saunters away to harass a pair of Hufflepuffs, Hecate turns to her. “How do you have this figured out already? I know you haven’t had silent spellcasting in another class.”

“Walburga hates children,” Narcissa explains. “If we were being too noisy for her—and we usually were—she would Silence us. Bellatrix turned it into a game, seeing who could cast the countercharm the fastest. Once you get one silent spell down, the rest come quickly.”

“I don’t know why I asked. I knew the answer was just going to upset me.”

“Merlin,” mutters Arachne in agreement.

“Look at me and really focus on how badly you to disarm me,” Narcissa says. “Visualize my wand leaving my hand and think the incantation. It’s about intentionality.”

“What if I don’t want to disarm you badly enough?” Arachne asks.

“If you don’t, I’m going to give you a boil in the middle of your forehead. You’ll have to get bangs—” The force of two Disarming Charms hitting her simultaneously makes Narcissa stagger backward and sends her wand flying. She claps. “Yes! Like that.”

Hecate and Arachne grin at each other, pleased with their success. 

“Again,” Narcissa says. “Only this time, I’m not going to jinx you if you don’t get it right. I’m just going to stand here and mind my own business either way.”

Hecate manages to disarm her again, but Arachne’s charm only tugs at her wand a little. She scowls. “I would like to be able to do this without the threat of bangs looming over my head.”

“You’d look cute with bangs,” Hecate assures her. 

“Not the point. Can I try again?”

Narcissa nods. “Ready when you are.”

It takes Arachne two more tries, but she does it. Dolohov dismisses them in order to make more room for the groups still struggling. “Keep practicing and read the first two chapters of your textbook before class next week,” he calls after them. 

When they’re safely out of earshot, Hecate turns to Narcissa. “Alright, what the fuck was that about?”

Arachne doesn’t look like she approves of the language, but she does nod along. “I thought you didn’t know Dolohov?”

Narcissa drags them to the library and puts up an anti-eavesdropping ward so she can explain about Bellatrix, Voldemort, and their new professor’s tattoo. 

“You should report him,” unexpectedly, this advice comes from Hecate. Her brown eyes are unusually serious.

“Slughorn won’t believe her. Did you see him fawning over Dolohov at the Welcoming Feast?”

“McGonagall then. McGonagall likes her. Or Dumbledore even,” Hecate says. 

“Dumbledore is the one who hired him,” Narcissa points out before they can keep arguing. “And it’ll be fine. I probably shouldn’t have antagonized him. If he stays angry I’ll apologize. I’ll say I worry about Bellatrix, or resent Voldemort for luring her away.”

“He threatened you!” exclaims Hecate. “With Greyback!”

“That’s a bit beyond the point of an apology,” Arachne agrees, sounding sorry about it. “That bit about pretty girls and revenge, that was over the line.” 

“My skin was crawling and he wasn’t even looking at me,” says Hecate. 

Narcissa is left trying and failing to soothe her riled friends before they go to lunch. They both insist on accompanying her when she shows the first years where their flying lessons will be later in the week, then to the greenhouses where she leaves the first years, then back to the castle for Charms. 

Flitwick, in a move that’s either extremely passive-aggressive or meant to be thoughtful, has Madam Meadowsweet there to start teaching them the basics of healing.


	13. fickle as poison and hard as clay

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you enjoy! lucius will be back in like three or four chapters unless i go off on a wild plot tanget which. possible. chapter title from "devils" by amelia curran

Narcissa writes Lucius back, saying she would be delighted if he came to visit. His job sounds interesting, and she likes all magical creatures, not just demons. Also, she’s still concerned about Slughorn. Her first Potions class isn’t until Monday, so she at least has the weekend as a buffer. The closer she can imply she and Lucius are, the better. The Malfoys haven’t been particularly respected since the French Revolution, but old names still carry weight. Arachne, Hecate, Jupiter, and Snape all watch with interest as she composes the letter during breakfast. 

“You should send him a poem,” Jupiter says.

Arachne nods enthusiastically. “It would be so romantic!”

Hecate and Snape both mime gagging, then glare at each other. 

“I’m not sending him a poem,” says Narcissa. “I don’t even know if he likes poetry.”

“Well, what does he like?” Arachne asks. 

“Me, I guess. Hippogriffs. Probably his owl, if he tolerates her attitude. Food, I think.”

“He’s an eighteen-year-old boy,” Hecate says frankly. “The parts about you and food are givens.” 

“There are poems about food,” Jupiter tells her. “This is just to say, _I have eaten the plums that were the icebox and which you were probably saving for breakfast._ ”

“William Carlos Williams,” Snape mutters. 

“Or, _mark but this flea, and mark in this, how little that which thou deniest me is; it sucked me first, and now sucks thee, and in this flea our two bloods mingled be_ —you know who wrote that one, Snape?”

Snape, scarlet-faced, examines his porridge rather than Jupiter. “John Donne. Not sure if it counts as being about food though.”

“Oh, don’t tease him,” says Arachne.

“He’s the one that recognized the poem!” Jupiter protests.

“Yours truly,” Narcissa says loudly, speaking as she writes, “Narcissa Black. See? No poems necessary.”

“All joking aside, do you want to marry him?” Arachne asks.

Her situation with Rabastan Lestrange must be weighing on her mind if she’s worrying about Narcissa being forced into an unpleasant marriage. Narcissa resolves to do more research in her free time while she waits for Bellatrix and Andromeda to write back. She’s a Prefect, which means she has some, albeit limited, access to the Restricted Section. There has to be something untraceable she can do to Rabastan. She thinks about Malfoy while her friends study her. “I don’t know,” she says finally. “He’s—kind, I suppose. To animals and children. Well, he’s good with Regulus. And Bellatrix kidnapped him over the summer, and he mostly just seemed resigned, so I know he won’t mind my family. There are worse options.”

“Personally, I would stop associating with you if Bellatrix kidnapped me,” Jupiter says. “No offense.”

“No offense taken.”

“Isn’t his family…” Hecate glances at Snape and decides to say something more polite, “short on funds at the moment?”

“Do you know what my dowry looks like with Bellatrix and Andromeda disowned?” Narcissa asks dryly. “I’ll be fine.”

“Unless he gambles it away,” says Jupiter. “That’s what my father did with Iphigenia’s. His most recent wife,” he adds when he sees them looking at them blankly.

“That’s why I didn’t remember her name,” Narcissa murmurs half to herself. 

“She’s only two years older than me,” Jupiter tells her, “but she went to Beauxbatons. That’s why you don’t know her.”

“She seems nice,” Narcissa says for lack of anything better to say. Nineteen years old with two children, and married to Mr. Flint until he finally smokes enough that his lungs ceased to function. She wishes she hadn’t been so reluctant to take the first years off her hands. The poor woman needed a break. 

“She is,” Jupiter says. “Far too nice for my father.”

The entire group sits in silence for a moment, considering that. Narcissa knows none of their home lives could be described as happy—she’s the one that healed Snape’s bruises his first night in Slytherin, and Arachne’s father clearly cares more about prestige than his family if he’s thinking about marrying her to Rabastan. Hecate doesn’t talk about her family, but there are enough whispers about the Carrows that she doesn’t have to. Jupiter, well. His mother left for a reason, and it has to hurt that she didn’t take him with her. 

“On that note,” she says. “You’ve got Defense, right, Jupiter?”

He nods. “Snape has a free period if you’re busy and your ducklings need help.”

Snape looks at Narcissa imploringly. “Please don’t stick me with the first years.”

“Calm down. The Hufflepuffs have flying and they know how to get there. The rest of them are free, probably in their common rooms. I was actually going to tell you to watch out for Dolohov, Jupiter. You too, when you have him, Snape.”

Snape takes in the thunderous expressions on Arachne and Hecate’s faces and decides not to ask. 

Jupiter is not quite as wise. “What’s wrong with him? I mean, he's obviously an idiot if he was willing to take the Defense posting, but the bounty hunting thing sounded kind of cool.”

“His politics are rather extreme,” Narcissa says because she doesn’t want to explain about Voldemort here in the middle of the Great Hall.

“Also he threatened you!” Arachne exclaims. “Don’t leave that part out.”

Jupiter shrugs. “That’s enough for me,” he says. “I’ll give Fatima a heads up. Are you planning to tell the first years anything?”

“Haven’t decided,” says Narcissa, uncertain she’s capable of explaining what a man who thinks a significant portion of the student body should be killed is doing teaching at a school. “I’ve got the weekend to decide.”

\------

Narcissa’s mind is made up for her when she comes across Elizabeth Keene backed into a corner by two third year Gryffindors after the Xylomancy meeting lets out that night. Divination has never been her strong suit, even when scattered sticks are involved. Still, it’s interesting to hear about the properties of different woods, and Trevor had spent the entire time rapt, staring unblinkingly at Mistress Corylus. Narcissa’s eyes flick from Elizabeth—defiant, eyes blazing while she glares up at the boys twice her size—to the menacing third years themselves. From where he’s peering out of her bookbag, Trevor begins to rumble threateningly.

“Ten points from Gryffindor,” she says, which makes all three of the younger students jump. Sixteen years under Walburga Black’s roof means she moves like a ghost.

“But—” begins one of the Gryffindors.

“Each. Unless you have a compelling reason for bothering one of my first years?”

“I’m fine!” Elizabeth protests.

Narcissa looks between them, ignoring Elizabeth. They look at their shoes. “No?” she prompts. “There’s plenty of time before curfew if you’d like to explain.”

The Gryffindor on the right mumbles something that ends in “Slytherin.”

“She’s a Slytherin?” Narcissa asks.

The boy nods. “I’m sorry. It’s not her, really. It’s just—”

“Wilkes called him a...I don’t want to say it. And we’re tired of being treated like that!” the other boy says. He looks less apologetic.

“Mudblood?” Narcissa guesses, and they both flinch like they’ve been slapped. 

“...yes,” says the first boy. “I’m not! I swear. My father was a wizard, he left before I was born—”

“I don’t care,” Narcissa tells him, suddenly exhausted. “You could be the second coming of Slytherin himself and I wouldn’t care. I am, for what it’s worth, sorry about what Wilkes said to you. He’s an idiot—a fact that you will not repeat if you know what’s good for you. However, attacking a defenseless _Muggleborn_ first year is not the answer to how helpless or dirty he made you feel, no matter what color her tie is.”

Both of the boys look at Elizabeth, startled. “She’s in Slytherin?” the second one asks. 

“The Hat said I could be great,” Elizabeth tells them. “And I will. What’s it to you?”

“Nothing, it’s just...someone like you, in Slytherin?”

Elizabeth draws herself up to her full height, which means she doesn’t quite reach Narcissa’s shoulder. “Someone like me?”

Narcissa looms behind her while the boys stutter and try to explain themselves to the furious girl until she has calmed down. She then releases them with strict instructions to leave the first years alone from now on and to report Wilkes either to her or McGonagall if he bothers them again. “Are you alright?” she asks Elizabeth. 

“You said people might be mean because of who my parents are,” the girl says accusingly. “You didn’t say anything about my House.” 

“I’m sorry,” says Narcissa. “First years are usually left out of the politicking. I’d have warned you if I thought it was relevant.”

“Hmm.” 

“Come on, let’s go back to the Common Room. I have an idea. Those boys aren’t the only ones that might try to bother you or any of the other first years for that matter.”

“Are you going to curse them?” 

The prospect of violence seems to have cheered the younger girl up. 

“No,” says Narcissa. “I’m going to ward you though, and the others too.”

“Cool,” Elizabeth decides after a moment. “What’s a mudblood?”

They round the corner and Narcissa spots McGonagall in cat form. Judging by the way her tabby fur has bristled, she heard at least part of that exchange. 

“Oh, a cat!” says Elizabeth. “Do you think it’s friendly?”

She crouches down and extends a hand before Narcissa can stop her. McGonagall bats at her lightly, claws sheathed. Then she starts to purr. 

“Incredible,” Narcissa mutters. “About your question though—mudblood is a derogatory term for someone with Muggle parents. It means dirty blood.”

“Oh,” says Elizabeth. She stops scratching McGonagall’s ears. “So, is there anything special about people with magical parents’ blood? Is it a different color or does it sparkle or something?”

“Sparkle?” Narcissa asks, distracted by the sheer ridiculousness of the thought.

“Because of the magic.”

“Because of the magic,” she repeats. If she were Muggleborn and eleven years old, she supposes it would be a reasonable thought. “No, there’s nothing special about it. Mine’s just as red as yours, I imagine.” 

Elizabeth looks thoughtful. “Do Muggleborns have rude words for people with magical parents, then?” 

Inbred, Narcissa thinks. She doesn’t say it. “Not as far as I know. Please don’t go around repeating that word, by the way. It really is unkind.”

“Wilkes said it.” 

“Wilkes won’t be saying it again.”

“Are you going to curse him?”

“You really want to see me curse someone, don’t you?”

Elizabeth shrugs. “What you did to that man in the potion shop, that was cool. I want to be able to do that someday.”

“If you work hard in your classes, you’ll be able to do far more than that someday,” Narcissa tells her. “I panicked. Transfiguration isn’t my strong suit. There are a hundred other things I should have done instead.” 

“It worked though.”

“It did work,” Narcissa agrees. Not well enough to keep Greyback from escaping from custody, but it had worked. “Can you find your way back to the Common Room from here?”

Elizabeth frowns. “Maybe?”

“Give it a try. It’ll be good practice. I won’t let you get too lost.” 

Cat McGonagall follows them while Elizabeth hesitantly meanders toward the dungeons. Narcissa only has to correct her twice before they’re standing in front of the expanse of wall that marks the entrance. “Go find Hecate and Arachne, or Fatima or Jupiter. Tell them to keep an eye on you until I get back.”

“Where are you going?”

“The Library,” Narcissa lies. “If you think your homework is bad now, just wait until you’re a sixth year. And if Wilkes so much as looks at you, I want to know about it.”

“Yes, Mum,” Elizabeth says. She seems to have completely recovered from the evening’s excitement because she rolls her eyes.

Narcissa watches to make sure the door closes securely behind the girl, then looks down at McGonagall. “Did you have something to say, professor?”

McGonagall meows and flicks her tail, a clear indication for Narcissa to follow her. Narcissa does, all the way to a dusty, mostly unused storage room of some sort. It’s there that she turns back into a woman. She looks furious.

“Two of my own House—! And Wilkes! Would that be Sylvan, in your year?”

“It would,” Narcissa says, watching the older woman pace. “Are you feeling alright?”

“Alright?” she demands. If McGonagall still had a tail, she would be lashing it. “That kind of language! That behavior!”

“Surely you know what it’s like.”

It’s the wrong thing to say. “What it’s like!” exclaims McGonagall. She appears to forcibly calm herself. “I apologize, Miss Black. I don’t mean to shout.”

Narcissa shrugs, but the corner of her mouth turns up. “Was that shouting? I have to say, Aunt Walburga is far more impressive.” 

“Be that as it may,” says McGonagall, who has clearly decided to move beyond that comment rather than trying to decide whether it was a compliment or not, “I was looking for you to confirm a rather alarming report.”

“That Bellatrix ran off to join Voldemort or that Andromeda eloped?”

“...that Professor Dolohov threatened you.”

“Right,” says Narcissa, who really should know better than to guess what someone is thinking if only to avoid incriminating herself. “Who told you? Was it Hecate?” 

“Severus Snape, actually, although he did cite evidence from Miss Carrow and Miss Greengrass.” 

“Snape?” asks Narcissa, baffled. “Snape doesn’t even like me.” 

“Mr. Snape is a very astute young man with surprising depths. He’s also, unless I’m very much mistaken, worried about you.”

“There’s nothing to worry about,” Narcissa says automatically. “I baited Dolohov. He reacted. That’s all.” 

“How so?”

Narcissa stays stubbornly silent. McGonagall sighs. “You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to. However, the more evidence I’m able to gather against Professor Dolohov, the greater the likelihood I can convince the Headmaster to remove him.”

“You won’t associate my name with the report?”

“Not if you don’t want me to.”

“Fine,” says Narcissa, and she tells her. Voldemort, Bellatrix, the tattoo, and the reference to Greyback. “That’s probably why Snape went to you, honestly. He’s terrified of werewolves.”

“Not an unreasonable fear with the likes of Greyback roaming around.” 

“Oh, Greyback is the exception. Lupin is alright.”

“You know about Mr. Lupin?”

“...no.”

“Merlin,” McGonagall says with feeling. “Go back to your Common Room, Miss Black. I need to speak with the Headmaster. The situation with Professor Dolohov is far more serious than I had originally thought, and I’d like to discuss new measures to prevent bullying and name-calling as well.”

“Don’t worry about Wilkes,” Narcissa tells her. “He won’t be a problem after tomorrow.”

McGonagall sighs. “Plausible deniability please, Miss Black.”

“You call me Narcissa in private if you’d like.” 

“I will endeavor to remember that.”


	14. interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy (late) first birthday to this fic! here's a little lucius, as a treat

Lucius glances up just in time to nearly have his eyes taken out by a nondescript brown owl. He ducks at the last moment, and the letter it’s carrying falls on his head. The owl flips its tail and him and soars away without waiting for a response. It's incredibly poor manners for a post owl, not that he can judge given Lamp’s attitude and general bloodlust. 

He’s working with a recent rescue, a highly strung mare confiscated from some mid-level Bavarian Ministry official. Her back half is chestnut and her front half is vaguely reminiscent of a golden eagle. She has yet to be convinced that she likes humans, fast movements, or loud noises, which is why he doesn’t shake his fist or yell after the owl. The letter is from Narcissa Black, whose handwriting he recognizes despite how few letters they’ve exchanged.

His heart and stomach feel funny in a way one’s internal organs likely shouldn’t when he looks at the neat, blocky letters spelling out his name. He’s been trying to be better about identifying his emotions on the advice of Calliope Dumont, his mother’s lone happily married friend, so he thinks about this for a minute. Is he nervous? Excited? Mostly he’s just sort of nauseous, he decides.

Madam Dumont would not be impressed with that assessment, but she’s not here, and anyway, Narcissa’s letter might say that she never wants to see him again. A bit of panic is justified, in that case. Or she might be enthusiastically looking forward to seeing him at Hogwarts next month? That’s almost worse because that means she likes him, and Lucius will have to continue trying to be likable, which is not something he excels at in the long term if any of the girls he knew in school are to be believed. The point is, there’s nothing the letter could say that won’t terrify him, and Madam Dumont is wrong when she says being nauseous and having a headache aren’t emotions.

“What do you think?” he asks the mare. She had sidled closer to him while he wasn’t paying attention. Among their many sins, hippogriffs are incurably nosy.

She blinks large amber eyes at him and clacks her beak, so he gives her a molasses treat. They’re trying to encourage her to like and interact with humans, and that counts even if he’s half sure it had been an insult. That done, and with nothing left to distract him, he opens the letter.

It’s brief but friendly. She says she’d like to see him but not much else. “It’s good news,” he tells the mare. “She wants to see me again, at least. Maybe to tell me she hates me in person?”

She keeps blinking at him.

“Right, you’re right. I’m being ridiculous.”

Hippogriffs are complicated to socialize, more so if they’ve been abused or neglected like this one. The original hippogriffs were the result of griffins crossbreeding with horses, but their population had eventually stabilized and they’d become a separate species. The problem, as far as Lucius can tell, is that horses were domesticated and griffins were not. That meant hippogriffs weren’t necessarily tamed or feral, but they weren’t quite wild either.

They’re not as smart as griffins—not shocking, given their equine ancestry—but they’re on par with a human five-year-old and eight or nine times as vain. They’re smart enough to cause plenty of trouble, but they lack the wisdom to foresee the consequences of their actions. They're rather like Lucius himself, in that respect, but he still might outgrow that particular trait. Working at a hippogriff rescue is a bit like babysitting, except his charges outweigh him, and they’ve got claws like the kind of knife a sensible person carries in Knockturn Alley.

Lucius doesn’t carry a knife in Knockturn Alley both because he’s not sensible and because he’s only ever been there once with Narcissa, Sirius, and Regulus. The three youngest Blacks—or Narcissa or Sirius on their own, really—are more than enough to deter unwanted attention. He’s also six feet tall and blond, which most people find plenty unsettling even though he’s still in the weedy stages of young adulthood. That’s not the point either. Back to hippogriffs. 

While he shudders to think what their digestive systems look like given their mixed herbivorous and carnivorous ancestry, Lucius loves working with the hippogriffs. His parents both tolerate it too, which might be the most surprising thing of all. His mother tells her friends he’s a philanthropist. His father likes that he’s contributing to the family Gringotts vault and spending time doing something properly manly and outdoorsy.

He’s not actually sure his father understands that Lucius spends most of his time talking softly to frightened animals that could kill him. Of course, his father started life in the court of Tsar Nicholas II and then survived the Revolution of 1917 as a young man, so perhaps he understands more than Lucius thinks he does.

He locks up every muscle in his body and probably permanently damages something in his back in order to avoid twitching when something begins to tug on his hair. It’s the chestnut mare, and she’s preening him. Forget about their claws; the real danger hippogriffs pose is their stealth. He is going to have a heart attack before he’s thirty and his obituary is going to be stupid.

“Am I that gross that I need a bath?” he asks plaintively.

He’s rewarded with a slightly rougher tug on his short, stubby ponytail before she manages to undo it entirely.

“Well, I know I’m nowhere near as pretty as you, but you didn’t have to point it out.”

She lets out a smug chirp, and Lucius sighs.

“If anyone can do something about my hair, it’s you,” he tells her and leaves her to it.

He doesn’t mind sitting here. It’s good that she’s willingly interacting with him, and this gives him plenty of time to reread and overanalyze Narcissa’s letter.


	15. before the day is done

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> big shout out to slashmarks for the heads up about some runes apparently being hate symbols sometimes! did not know that, hopefully covered that suitably in this chapter/worked why the wizards don't use them because of that into the worldbuilding well enough for it to make sense
> 
> title from seven devils by florence and the machine because that's what's playing right now! hope you're all well! apologies for the delay. i have been playing so, so much stardew valley and also living in the us, which uses up most of my emotional energy these days.

Narcissa returns to the Common Room with a lot on her mind. She needs some of Wilkes' hair if she's going to do anything suitably terrible to him, although blood would be better. She still hasn't decided whether she wants to shout at Snape or thank him, so she puts that off until she sees what McGonagall manages to do about Dolohov. She also needs to figure out what to do about the first years, particularly Elizabeth.

Protective runes had been her first thought, but which ones to use? She could teach them a few minor jinxes that they ought to be able to manage, but that wouldn't do anything against an upper-year student, let alone a fully trained witch or wizard. Maybe monitoring spells to tell her if they were in danger? Possible, but she had to sleep sometime, and their privacy shouldn't be compromised on the off chance that it might keep them safe.

She could kill Dolohov. And Wilkes. And Rabastan. And Voldemort too, if she could manage it. That would solve so many problems. Unfortunately, murder probably wasn't a feasible option in all of those cases if she wanted to stay out of Azkaban. She doesn't have the political clout her uncle does, so disappearing her rivals is out for now. Narcissa pictures Dolohov's smug face. Maybe if she made it look like an accident…? Bounty hunters were sure to have enemies.

Not for the first time, she wishes blood magic were legal. She wouldn't use it to hurt anyone—well, maybe Rabastan—and it would make her life much easier. A few esoteric symbols drawn on the foreheads of her first years, and no one would be able to lay a finger on them. She does have the blood amulet she'd made over the summer stashed safely in her trunk. It wouldn't be recognizable unless you already knew what it was, which wasn't something anyone would admit to. That, she decides, will go to Elizabeth.

That leaves the rest of the first years, along with Snape, Hecate, and Arachne. And Jupiter, she supposes, although he's more than capable of taking care of himself. The benefits of being of age, a man, and a pureblood, she thinks. Maybe Fatima, too, although most people have the common sense to leave her alone.

"Earth to Narcissa," someone says, and her eyes refocus on Hecate. Elizabeth is bouncing at her elbow.

"Yes?"

"Astronomy's not until Monday. Where's your head?"

"Just thinking," says Narcissa.

"About?"

"Murder."

"Obviously," says Hecate. "Why wouldn't you be."

"Do you think Snape or Jupiter could get me some of Wilkes's hair?"

Hecate is silent for a moment. "You know," she says finally. "I really don't want to know. I'll ask them."

"You're the best," Narcissa tells her honestly, then she strides over to where Arachne and the rest of the first years are huddled by the fire, trailed by Elizabeth.

"Did you curse Wilkes?" the girl asks.

"Not yet."

"Yet," Elizabeth repeats, looking cheered.

"Yet," Arachne echoes, looking resigned.

And that, right there, was the difference five years of knowing the Black family made. Or perhaps Elizabeth is simply particularly bloodthirsty. It's hard to say at that age.

"Can all of you go and grab your school robes?" Narcissa asks the gaggle of children.

The first years look at each other, seem to decide collectively that they're going to humor her, and scuttle for the stairs. 

"Do I want to know?" Arachne asks.

"I'm not doing anything illegal," Narcissa says. "Just a few protective runes. I haven't decided which ones to use yet, which complicates matters…"

"Can't you just do a few general ones for health or safety?" Arachne, who made the intelligent decision to take Arithmancy and Care of Magical Creatures as her electives and never looked back, wants to know.

"It's complicated. The International Federation on Runic Languages and Symbols is thinking about removing some of the easier options from general use, so I’m left with obscure languages that aren't as powerful or stringing together a few less specific options to get the same effect…" Narcissa trails off, thinking about it.

"They're changing Ancient Runes," Arachne says flatly. "Why wouldn't they?"

"Well," Narcissa feels obligated to explain. "It turns out Muggle hate groups, I think like the Muggle version of Grindelwald's followers or Voldemort's now, I suppose? I'm not sure. They're hard to research, and you know what Walburga is like. Anyway, similarly violent ideologies, and they've co-opted some of the runes, and since the history and collective intent behind a rune can change the effect, results have been getting unpredictable."

"Huh," says Arachne, this time thoughtful. "The Muggles caused all of that?"

Narcissa shrugs. "Professor Blishen has a whole rant about it." The first years return just then, so she leaves off complaining and pulls her sewing kit out of her book bag. "More women's work, I'm afraid," she tells Ogden, which earns her a shy smile. Good. Proof she hadn't upset him too badly with her last lecture. "Who wants to learn about runes?"

The first years blink at her. "You're sewing runes?" Jeremiah hazards. "Does that work?"

"You had better hope so," Narcissa says, but she softens when they start to look alarmed. "Yes, it works. We've been doing thread magic since before witches and wizards thought to carry wands. Here, you can do it too, and you don't even really need to know a runic language."

The first years look skeptical. Their expressions become even more doubtful when Narcissa tells them to take off one of their socks and starts handing out needles and thread.

There's a pause where she explains how to thread a needle, necessarily lengthened because she only has the one needle threading tool, and eleven-year-olds aren't known for their commitment to difficult tasks. Also, her hands are shaking too badly to do the threading for them. Apparently, a steady diet of tea and stress will do that to a person.

"Alright," she says. "What do you think of when you think about light? No, don't tell me. Embroider it. It doesn't have to be anything fancy."

That leads to a demonstration of different embroidery stitches for the boys and Elizabeth, none of whom had ever had to do any sort of sewing before.

Narcissa sets about designing a protective design on a spare bit of graphing paper now that the first years are occupied.

It's more complicated than she thought it would be. Professor Blishen had crabbily scratched _elhaz_ , the life rune, out of all of their textbooks, which took out the foundation of what she otherwise would have planned.

It takes ten minutes and two smothered fires—one hers, one Latona Selwyn's—before she has a design that doesn't combust when she taps her wand to it. The graph paper she had drawn it on cheerfully deflects the Stunner she sends at it, which makes her frown even as she dives to the side. It fizzles out on the wall about her head. It would be better if it absorbed curses rather than reflecting them, but she would take what she could get.

She Conjures more needles, starts the design inside each of the robes' breast pockets, waves her wand, and _focuses_. The robes rise very slowly, and the needles begin to flash as they dive in and out of the thick fabric. It's more impressive than it looks, a dated American spell from the magical population across the Atlantic's brief stint attempting to keep up with Muggle textile production. It doesn't take much power, but it had fallen out of favor because of the concentration it takes to get the designs right.

What Narcissa is doing involves relatively simple runes, which makes it easier still. Complicated florals and beaded patterns were nearly impossible to manage with any sort of consistency.

It takes her forty-five minutes of agonizing concentration to finish the designs. By this time, Arachne has doused three more potential sock infernos, and Jeremiah has somehow successfully convinced his sock to produce a blindly, brilliant white light. Ogden’s sock flashes through every color of the rainbow, goes dark for a moment, then repeats the process. Everyone else has managed to produce very soft glows, which is what she’d been expecting. 

Narcissa returns the robes. "Put these on and try to jinx each other," she instructs, which is all of the encouragement they need to abandon their socks and start a brawl.

She watches them critically for several moments, blocks one Jelly-Legs jinx when it comes bouncing her way, then breaks it up.

"Perfect," she says. "You're all set. Elizabeth, stick around for a second."

"What about my sock?" Jeremiah wants to know. "I can't walk around like this."

Several of the others—Ogden in particular—nod in agreement.

Narcissa fixes the socks. "Better?" she asks. Jeremiah's is still glowing faintly even after she undid the stitches of an extremely blobby sun, so she's not quite sure what he'd done. At least it doesn't hurt to look at it anymore.

She gets the blood amulet for the depths of her trunk, taps Trevor affectionately on the head, then leaves him napping on her bed to return to the Common Room.

As far as necklaces go, the blood amulet looks reasonably innocuous. The gem seems more like garnet than ruby, although the color isn't quite right for either of them. It's on a long silver chain. Narcissa deposits over Elizabeth's head, making the younger girl squeak in alarm.

"What's this?"

"If anyone asks, you don't know where you got it or what it is," Narcissa advises. "It absorbs ill intent that would otherwise be directed toward you. Also, some curses. Let me know if it turns black."

Elizabeth eyes it with interest. "Is this illegal?"

"Not to have, technically," Narcissa tells her after a brief moment of consideration.

"Cool."

"It is pretty cool," Narcissa agrees.

Because she's eleven, Elizabeth has already moved onto the next topic. "Are you going to curse Wilkes now?"

Narcissa sighs.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Interested in saying hi on social media? I'm on [Tumblr](https://peonyprice.tumblr.com/) and [Twitter](https://twitter.com/PeonyPrice)


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